The Right Wing and Their Media Empire – Fact Checkers Need Not Apply

I’ve complained many, many times on BC about how the Right Wing seems to give no consideration whatsoever to the importance of accuracy and factuality of the information they publish, but I can’t help but wonder just how big their lies have to be before Joe Everyman starts seeing the Far Right for what they really are. It’s not as if the Left is always completely truthful, but as I’ve pointed out so often before, it’s a matter of degree. The Right will see ONE fault by the Left and raise hell about it, and never seem to notice that their own faults are much more severe (see “Iraq War”, for one), and many times more numerous.

The fact that it never happened doesn’t appear to matter that much. The Right is now backing off from the story, but is there any real backlash against those major right-wing media sites that repeated the story? Of course not. But if, say, the Huffington Post had repeated it, one can imagine how the Right would trumpet it to the heavens.

But the above is only the latest example. There’s O’Keefe’s fraudulent and totally false attack that took down ACORN, which was funded by Breitbart and aired repeatedly on Fox News, Then there’s Breitbart’s attacks on Van Jones last year about Jones’ name being on an unsavory website…never mind that the owners of that site admitted they never had Jones’ permission to use his name.

Just as egregious is Breitbart’s takedown of Shirley Sherrod by truncating a speech of hers in such a way that it falsely made her look racist and wound up getting her fired…and THEN when the elderly white couple that were the alleged targets of Sherrod’s “racism” spoke up and said that Breitbart’s accusations were completely false, Breitbart had the temerity to claim the two elderly farmers were not who they said they were, that they were part of a ‘hoax’ to cover for Sherrod. It’s worth noting that Ms. Sherrod’s father was lynched by a white racist who (with others) beat him for a half hour dragged him feet-first through the county courthouse to a jail cell where he later died. None of the circumstances of her father’s lynching are debated – except by the conservative site The American Spectator that says it wasn’t really a lynching.

Now – does the Right care one whit about this rack of malicious distortions and outright lies foisted on the American public by Andrew Breitbart? Apparently not, because guess who was a guest speaker at the “Uni-Tea Rally”, a ‘diversity celebration’ sponsored by the Tea Party? You guessed it! Andrew Breitbart! And let’s not forget the Republican National Committee, which confirmed that at a Beverly Hills fundraiser in mid-August that will be hosted by RNC Chairman Michael Steele, their “Very Special Guest” will be none other than…Andrew Breitbart! But then it does seem that a talent for race-baiting seems to be a definite ‘plus’ for potential pundits and newscasters at FOX News.

So where does this all mean? Mr. Breitbart engaged in distortions, fabrications, and outright lies…but such are NOT the real outrage! What IS the real outrage, the hypocrisy of epic proportions, is the fact that neither the Republican party nor its lesser-yet-more-vicious many-headed clone the Tea Party deign to call Mr. Breitbart on the carpet for lying to them and causing them to join him in falsely accusing innocent people!

Mind you, this is not the first time the Right has risen up in ‘righteous’ anger against a strawman of their own construction. There’s a list of over four thousand – four thousand! – distortions, misrepresentations, ‘innocent’ errors, and outright lies by Fox News Channel and its ‘commentators’…and this list contains only what they’ve recorded since November 2004!

(FYI, there is NO comparable list of ‘inaccuracies’ by what the Right calls the ‘liberal-controlled media’. Gather together all the inaccuracies broadcast by ABC, CBS, NBC, MSNBC, and CNN over a similar period of time, and the cumulative total will still be FAR less than the total on Fox News Channel.)

That begs the question, then – WHY is it that the Right seems to be okay with being fed all these lies? It seems flatly impossible that those on the Right are so blind and ignorant that they can’t detect at least a significant portion of those lies, right?

Right. I cannot believe those on the Right are, well, that stupid. There’s got to be a reason why they cannot accept solid facts no matter how obvious those facts may be. I must give credit here to Roger Nowoleski, for he was the first one to point out to me that it’s not the facts that matter, but the emotions of the people. When emotions are involved, facts go right out the window.

That’s pretty much what this recent study found: “In a series of studies in 2005 and 2006, researchers at the University of Michigan found that when misinformed people, particularly political partisans, were exposed to corrected facts in news stories, they rarely changed their minds. In fact, they often became even more strongly set in their beliefs. Facts, they found, were not curing misinformation. Like an underpowered antibiotic, facts could actually make misinformation even stronger.” (italics mine)

This is apparently why the Right continues to trumpet the everlasting salvation that they believe lay in tax cuts for all and especially for the wealthy…never mind that Reagan Fed Chief Paul Volcker, Reagan Economic Advisor David Stockman, and Alan Greenspan ALL have said how disastrous the Bush tax cuts were for the American economy. But you know how it goes – now that the financial world’s two most powerful men of the last half century have come out against extending Bush’s tax cuts, well, that means they’re socialist communist nazis…and they might even be French! Horrors!

So that’s why they ignore the past ninety years of American history and pretend that the Republicans are truly the party of economic sanity. That’s why they ignore 97% of the world’s climatologists and the Mount Everest of evidence pointing to the reality of global warming caused by humanity (which now includes a 40% decrease of ALL the oceans’ phytoplankton since the 1950s – and the decrease is greatest in the parts of the ocean that have warmed the most). That’s why they ignored the war crimes committed by Bush/Cheney even when it included torture (which even George Washington and Abraham Lincoln refused to do when our nation was in far worse straits). That’s why they’re sure that racism plays little or no part in the Republican and Tea parties.

What’s the answer? How do we get them to listen to fact? I honestly don’t know…but here’s an observation: every time there’s an unseasonably cold day, my neo-con friend tends to point out about how it’s proof that there’s no such thing as global warming, and said exchange has become a bit of a standing joke between us. You see, he doesn’t care that the rest of the planet is so much warmer than normal – it’s what he physically sees and feels that matters. So is this the answer? Must those on the Right physically see and feel how bad the economy’s going to get under the GOP, how bad the weather’s going to get if we ignore the climatologists before Joe Republican starts to think, “well, just maybe those Democrats were right about something”? Is there a point where obvious facts will finally overcome their political dogma?

Maybe…but I don’t think so. I think it goes more along the line of Stephen Decatur’s famous exhortation of patriotism: “Our country! In her intercourse with foreign nations, may she always be in the right; but our country, right or wrong.” But in the case of the Right that has been steeped in the fantasies of “supply-side economics” and “Democrats and liberals are always wrong no matter how right they are” and spent the past generation in the thrall of an unelected punditocracy, I suspect their version of the quote will go, “Our Party! In her intercourse with those outside our Party, may she always be in the right; but our Party, right or wrong!” The Party (and its return to power) is all that matters…and fact-checkers need not apply.

Glenn, you seem to have redefined Andrew Breitbart as the entire right wing.

And as for this story about the west Texas ranches, it came up about a week ago and those of us tied into real right wing news sources knew it had been proven false within hours of when the story first surfaced.

Of course it was the same thing with the Sherrod story. The right wing media were the first to come out and admit that Breitbart’s take on the incident was flawed, a couple of days before the MSM began to pick up on it.

But you’re doing a good job processing and repeating the distorted view from the left.

Dave

Cannonshop

Dave, save your breath, it’s just more Pravda.

Oh, and Glenn? YOU’RE LATE-if you bothered to follow the “Right Wing” media, you’d know that both the West Texas Ranches story and the Sherrod debacle were first un-masked as bullshit by (drum rolll)

The right wing media and blogosphere.

You guys on the left are still behind, I really have to wonder how much Opposition Research you bother to do before getting your news from Daily Kos.

http://www.maskedmoviesnobs.com El Bicho

“‘confirmed’ by the San Diego Examiner,”

Why would anyone care what some unknown blogger confirmed?

“he was the first one to point out to me that it’s not the facts that matter, but the emotions of the people.”

You must not watch The Colbert Report because that’s close to what “truthiness” is.

Any links to the right wing media being the first to expose Brietbart? Not saying they weren’t but would like to see for myself

http://jeanniedanna.wordpress.com/ jeannie danna

Great article, Glenn,

Why does the right-wing media crank this incredible amount of bullshit out?

Because it works!

Just like now with the Al Gore smear. It’s just a coincidence that slandering him in the public eye not only makes him appear guilty, it will also help to discredit all that he professes.

Brrrr, I had to use an extra blanket last night it was so cold, so there is no such thing as global warming…

:)Glad your here!

Glenn Contrarian

I notice that both Dave and C-shop pooh-poohed what I wrote because it was (1) eventually disavowed by the right wing media machine and (2) it’s “yesterday’s news”…never mind that what I was doing was demonstrating how eager some on the Right are to pick up on inflammatory news without even a modicum of fact-checking…and in the case of the Sherrod story, this got picked up by the MSM of which Fox News is now part and parcel.

Problem is, Dave nor C-shop, neither of you got the POINT of the article, which is why isn’t the Right holding its own media to a standard of accuracy and factuality? If the Right were holding its own responsible, then why are the RNC and the Tea Parties still welcoming Andrew Breitbart as a ‘special guest speaker’?

I believe I said in the article that it’s not Breitbart that’s the real outrage – it’s that the Right still welcomes this MALICIOUS LIAR as a ‘special guest speaker’. Can either of you point to any nationally-known pundit or politician or news organization on the Left who has foisted so many unconscionable lies upon America and yet is still trusted by the DNC and Progressive Caucus? No you can’t, not by a country mile.

THAT, sirs, is the outrage. THAT, sirs, is the POINT of the article, and the question contained therein: why does the vast majority of the Right allow themselves to eagerly listen to those who lie again and again and again e.g. Breitbart and Fox News (not to mention Beck and Limbaugh)?

That is the question that neither of you addressed…and I strongly doubt you will.

Doug Hunter

You can simply google a left wing source, the Huffington Post, along with the word hoax or retraction and find lots of similiar examples. The stories should be filtered out and fact checked, but if you take the time to do that you will be scooped, not get the traffic, credit, and advertising $$$’s.

Jeannie, The real question should be why does the left wing blogosphere continue to crank the incredible amount of bullshit (like this article) out? Why are you and Glenn so much more interested in personal attacks, smears, and namecalling than factual discussion?

If you want to have a reasonable talk about how big a catastrophe global warming is or is not likely to be based on scientific evidence and fact then I’m up for it. If you want a list of all the other doom and gloom ‘scientific’ predictions from the green left over the last 100 years or so that have turned out to be horseshit I’ll provide that as well. If you’re just here to namecall and circle jerk with the likeminded then don’t bother responding.

Baronius

Michael Moore is treated as royalty by the Democratic Party. He’s guilty of at least the things you accuse Breitbart of, in a medium that allows for far more deliberation than the internet.

http://blogcritics.org/writers/dr-dreadful/ Dr Dreadful

…as for this story about the west Texas ranches, it came up about a week ago and those of us tied into real right wing news sources knew it had been proven false within hours of when the story first surfaced.

Did you say anything?

http://jeanniedanna.wordpress.com/ jeannie danna

Baronius, your #7 is a good example of reporting a piece of information as fact without anything to back it up:

Michael Moore is guilty of at least the things you accuse Breitbart of, in a medium that allows for far more deliberation than the internet.

link?

http://jeanniedanna.wordpress.com/ jeannie danna

Doug Hunter,

I will respond only because if I don’t respond, then you will have made some lame and pointless one-upmanship point in the fact that that I didn’t respond, so you now have your response.

Glenn Contrarian

Baronius –

Baronius, your #7 is a good example of reporting a piece of information as fact without anything to back it up

That’s Jeannie, quoted for truth…especially when Moore has NOT been shown to be foisting outright deliberate and malicious fraud upon the nation as Breitbart certainly did. But oh! I forgot! Despite the FACT that 97% of climatologists agree that global warming is REAL and that it IS caused by humanity, that’s all just a big fraud in your eyes! Yeah, that’s right! When nearly all of those most qualified to speak on a certain subject strongly agree on a conclusion, well, that means they must all be wrong because Republican dogma must never be called into question! For some reason this reminds me of a certain conflict between Galileo and the Catholic church….

But back to the subject at hand – in the article I included a link to over FOUR THOUSAND inaccuracies, distortions, and outright lies broadcast by Fox News commentators and newscasters since 2004. Again, I defy you or any other Right-winger to find a similar number of such by ABC, CBS, NBC, MSNBC, and CNN – there’s a few lists out there, but even if you added them ALL together, they don’t even approach what’s foisted upon the Right wing by Fox News.

But that won’t bother you or the rest of the Right-wingers who read this…because just as the research showed, facts don’t mean a whole lot to you. I guess we can see now why academia is usually strongly liberal…because little things like RESEARCH and SCIENTIFIC INQUIRY are always to be mistrusted if they dare call into question Republican dogma!

Cannonshop

Glenn,to be honest? you’re still getting it wrong-it was “Disavowed” (i.e. DEBUNKED) before the initial stories apparently crossed your horizon of awareness. (That’s the case in BOTH stories!)

#8 Doc, there wasn’t a thread appropriate to discuss it on Blogcritics at the time, and doing up one unfounded rumour then having to retract in an hour or so really isn’t a useful use of time. On the right, Breitbart’s already a suspect source of info, it would be like reporting “Dog bites man…again” or you writing comments on one of the more paranoid Daily Kos entries from the left. (I won’t go into the Michael Moore comparisons-Moore’s at least kind of funny and his agitprop at least has the benefit of being mildly amusing-in a cruel, watching hollywood worship the idiot sort of way.) Making any of Breitbart’s bullshit a controversy only serves to generate traffic for his site and raise his profile among the less-informed/less-intelligent. (remember? “No Publicity is Bad Publicity” in media.) Unlike the Left, folk on the right aren’t inclined to reward “Journalists” (Term used loosely) for making shit up.

Baronius

What part do you need evidence of, Jeannie: Michael Moore using deceptive editing or the respect he has within the Democratic Party?

http://jeanniedanna.wordpress.com/ jeannie danna

Al Gore has been cleared of these ludicrous and false allegations…anyone who doesn’t think that the filthy fossil fuel industry has their hands in this, is blinder than this idealist.

http://jeanniedanna.wordpress.com/ jeannie danna

Prove deceptive editing, Baronius.

http://blogcritics.org/writers/dr-dreadful/ Dr Dreadful

Cannon, Ruvy did bring the “incident” up on one thread, but nobody commented.

And anyway, isn’t this one of Glenn’s main points? That people tend to continue to believe something – often even more strongly – after it’s been shown not to be true; and that the GOP relies heavily on this phenomenon?

I asked the question mainly because Dave often claims to criticize Republicans as harshly as Democrats when they’re wrong, when in actuality his criticism tends to be meek at best.

Cannonshop

#16 Doc, if that were true, the Birthers would be prominent (they’re not.)

The stories in question were debunked among the Right pretty close to a full day before it was even noticed on the Left.

AS for Ruvy: he’s hit-or-miss, but you can’t seriously think he isn’t posting with an agenda or set of filters that are biased beyond normal levels.

Baronius, pardon me, but what is this mish mash your linking? What? Heston didn’t say “cold dead hands?” And then, you didn’t think it insensitive and in poor taste to place those bill boards right after Columbine?

?

Glenn Contrarian

C-shop –

If it’s not true, then why is Fox News – and Beck and Limbaugh – still so popular among the Right wing when the amount of documented inaccuracies, distortions, and outright lies on that network far outstrip even the cumulative amount by all the other MSM networks?

Why is that, C-shop?

As for your comment:

Unlike the Left, folk on the right aren’t inclined to reward “Journalists” (Term used loosely) for making shit up.

Then explain Glenn Beck, for whom there is NO equal on the Left when it comes to making crap up. Explain why in polls of conservatives, Right-wing pundits Beck and Limbaugh are almost ALWAYS in the top ten (and usually in the top FIVE) of any list of the most liked/respected/influential conservatives in America?

– here at usconservatives.com where Beck was deemed the top conservative of the decade;

– and here where another list showing Sean Hannity is No. 23, Mark Levin No. 26, Laura Ingraham is No. 28 and Glenn Beck made it to No. 6 (a leap from No. 18 in 2007)…and the big surprise was that Dick Cheney beat out Rush Limbaugh for the No. 1 spot. This wasn’t a poll, but an observation by an English newspaper giving a frank observation from outside the U.S. – which observation doesn’t differ much from polls held within the U.S.

Now whatever your PERSONAL opinion may be, these are the opinions of the Right Wing as a whole – otherwise Beck and Limbaugh wouldn’t rate so highly in ANY of these.

Will you answer those questions, C-shop? Betcha don’t…and if you did try, will you include references? Please pardon my skepticism on that last request…. Oh – and I strongly doubt you’ll disprove the polls I posted. Crazy-Train Beck and Family-Values Limbaugh are two of the most influential conservatives in the country and you cannot deny it.

FYI – in similar polls of liberals, the ONLY non-politician I saw in the top ten was Oprah at #7…and her shows normally don’t involve politics at all!

Dan

ha ha. Glenns link to support his claim of “O’Keefe’s fraudulent and totally false attack that took down ACORN” is merely one of the exposed ACORN workers looking to cash on a “reasonable expectation of privacy” legal claim.

It’s worth a try I suppose. If you have no shred of decency that is.

All of Glenns examples above are similary flawed. I don’t think he cares though.

Glenn Contrarian

Baronius –

I checked your ONE link to ONE set of splicing…and how exactly does this compare to Breitbart’s splicing? It DOESN’T. Moore’s splicing of Heston’s speech does NOT change the overall meaning of the speech itself wherein he said in so many words that the mayor of Denver was wrong for telling the NRA to stay away from Denver following the Columbine killings. All the addition of the billboard did was to add inflammatory meaning, but did NOT change one whit the overall thrust of Heston’s speech.

Breitbart, on the other hand, COMPLETELY CHANGED 180-OUT the meaning of Sherrod’s speech, falsely making this woman (whose father was lynched by a white racist) out to be a racist herself…yet he still headlined the “Uni-Tea Rally” and is still scheduled to be a “very special guest” at an RNC function in Hollywood.

The two don’t compare, Baronius. The facts do not support you – not that FACTS matter to conservatives these days (which was the whole point of the article)….

Glenn Contrarian

Dan –

Why don’t you do something that most Republicans don’t do – like RESEARCH?

But don’t worry – I did it for you. Here’s a link where Andrew Breitbart admitted that he was duped by O’Keefe’s ACORN hoax.

But be sure to remember that all us Democrats and liberals are Really Bad People and we’re always up to no good, okay?

It looks like this guy did a scene-by-scene analysis of Moore’s deceptions here.

Dan

ha ha. even more hilarious.

glenn, you must be delusional. Go read Breitbarts “admission”. None of the interviews in the ACORN exposures were spliced. O’Keefe simply did not wear a pimp suit in to the interview.

You should do better research instead of embarrassing yourself.

I’m considering a detailed dismantling of all your claims above. From past experience though, it seldom turns out worthwhile. Leftists really are all the things you accuse right wingers of, and being unable to accept and acknowledge their dishonest spin is the formost character trait that distinguishes them.

As another example of your shoddy research let’s examine this statement from your incoherent rant:

“It’s worth noting that Ms. Sherrod’s father was lynched by a white racist who (with others) beat him for a half hour dragged him feet-first through the county courthouse to a jail cell where he later died. None of the circumstances of her father’s lynching are debated”—glenn

Actually the person you describe above was only a relative of Ms. Sherrod. The incident happened before she was born.

Let’s see if you’ll do proper research and admit your mistake.

John Wilson

As a somewhat experienced Audio/Video editor (I actually made a living at it for a couple years) I investigated the O’Keefe videos and the method of falsification was painfully obvious. He overdubbed his original questions with incriminating questions to suit the answers of the ACORN people. Very clumsy. I doubt that any modern high-school student would make such crude edits. Apparently the political echo-chamber will grasp at anything for scandal.

I think Jon Stewart did a parody of video forging and created a video about the East Coast heatwave wherein some black person (Sherrod?) said: “I’m responsible for the heatwave because I hate the environment and America”.

NB: the above statement is a FRAUD, a PARODY! Please don’t run off to FOX claiming it’s the truth!

I repeat, it’s a FRAUD written for comic effect!

Arch Conservative

Glenn are you the pot or the kettle?

http://jeanniedanna.wordpress.com/ jeannie danna

Sorry, I was so abrupt with you , Ruvy, I certainly didn’t want to slur an entire nation.

http://blogcritics.org/writers/dr-dreadful/ Dr Dreadful

Cannon (@ #16):

Sorry if I seem to be moving the goalposts, but I had in mind the GOP leadership, rather than the various fringe groups with no real power. (Dave’s verbal mud-wrestling contests with the über-libertarian and wacky elements of his own Texas Republican Party have been well-documented.)

For example, Dave claims to have been as severely critical, if the occasion so warranted, of the Bush administration as he is of Obama’s. But when one looks at this “severe” criticism, it tends to turn out to be of the “Tsk, tsk. Dear me” variety.

Baronius

Dan – I know what you mean. I figure on the off-chance that someone on this thread doesn’t know that Michael Moore edits his clips, I can provide a little documentation. But I don’t have a lot of confidence that I’m going to change anyone’s mind.

http://blogcritics.org/writers/dr-dreadful/ Dr Dreadful

Leftists really are all the things you accuse right wingers of, and being unable to accept and acknowledge their dishonest spin is the formost character trait that distinguishes them.

That’s true of elements on both sides, Dan.

http://takeitorleaveit.typepad.com/ roger nowosielski

Let’s examine Dan’s argument. Making reference to Ms Sherod’s father lynching, he states: “Actually the person you describe above was only a relative of Ms. Sherrod. The incident happened before she was born.”

Let’s see now. Ms Sherod is an African-American, black for short. Presumable, Ms Sherod’s father’s relative is also a black, or at least part-black. Now, Dan would have us believe that a black man would take part in another black man’s lynching. That’s rather unheard of and supporting evidence is in short supply. Link, please?

Secondly, Dan argues that the incident is of little or no effect because it transpired before Ms Sherod was born. A subtle argument, to say the least, because there can be no question the event could be as traumatic insofar as Ms Sherod is concerned if she were alive. So yes, Dan scores a half-point here. Still, it’s odd to be able to dismiss this incident on that basis alone, as though it were of no effect whatever.

All told, Dan displays here an odd sort of sensibility. One only wonders if Dan could address this issue in such a lighthearted manner if the shoe were on the other foot.

http://takeitorleaveit.typepad.com/ roger nowosielski

Oh, I beg your pardon. There is an ambiguity in the posting I failed to notice.

It was “only” the relative of Ms Sherod (and of Ms Sherod’s father) who was lynched – not Ms Sherod’s father himself. That makes quite a difference!

Ms Sherod has obviously misplaced her grief and her mixed feelings about whites since it was only her relative that had met such an infamous end.

“Grow up, Ms Sherod,” we should all say. “Don’t make a mountain out of a haystack. Take things in stride.”

Dan

“Don’t make a mountain out of a haystack”

or try finding a needle in a mole hill.

Baronius

And your advice to her, Roger, would be “put yourself in a position of power over innocent people of the same race as those who committed the crime, and make them pay for it”.

http://handyfilm.blogspot.com handyguy

I don’t think Dan is claiming that Mrs. Sherrod’s father was not murdered when she was 17. That is not in dispute. Dan is apparently saying that Glenn attributed some details of an earlier incident to the later murder.

The racist intent of the father’s murderer was ambiguous. But the fact that no one was indicted [by an all white grand jury], despite three witnesses to the killing, is not. This was not unusual in the South in 1965.

If Dan is actually claiming Mrs. Sherrod’s father was not murdered when Mrs. Sherrod was a teenager, he needs to provide some backup. No one seems to be seriously questioning that story.

http://handyfilm.blogspot.com handyguy

If Michael Moore amplifies his movies through selective editing [they are pretty openly propagandistic entertainments] — and if Andrew Breitbart has no qualms about posting misleading ‘raw’ video on his site and claiming it ‘proves’ something — then maybe they are playing variations of the same game.

But does one justify the other in any way? And shouldn’t the manipulative editing or omissions be exposed when we find out about them?

Of course they should. Some of us are getting too caught up in defending “our team” and demoting the truth to secondary importance.

It’s not a ball game.

http://handyfilm.blogspot.com handyguy

Baronius, #36: Could you be any more obnoxious/superfluous? That’s just awful. Next time you’re bursting a blood vessel about people bringing up racism all the time, please remember that you wrote that.

http://takeitorleaveit.typepad.com/ roger nowosielski

And your advice to her, Roger, would be “put yourself in a position of power over innocent people of the same race as those who committed the crime, and make them pay for it”.

No, that wouldn’t be my advice to her, but one can readily understand the reaction. People have been vengeful for much less. (The important thing is, she outgrew it.)

But you’re so pure at heart, of course, that you find her reaction unfathomable.

Nice try, Baronius, but no cigar.

http://takeitorleaveit.typepad.com/ roger nowosielski

At least Michael Moore – and I don’t care for the guy, he does look the sleazy type – makes no bones about it. Everyone knows where he stands, by his own admission.

So at least in this respect, he’s honest about it.

Baronius

Handy, I think that Breitbart’s case is different. He’s running internet sites, and that means time is of the essence. Breitbart’s sites post maybe 20 articles a day. I didn’t follow the Sherod story as it progressed, but I did follow the ACORN one, and they did nothing irresponsible that I can see. O’Keefe put credits at the beginning and end of his videos, in which he danced around as a pimp. That’s all.

But getting back tp my point, even if you grant for the sake of argument that Breitbart has continually used deception and done so deliberately, Glenn is wrong to cite him as an example of something that would never happen in the Democratic Party. That demonstrates that Glenn’s bluster is simple partisanship.

I reread my comment #39, and I really don’t understand your response. I don’t think Sherrod did such a thing, but Roger suggests that it would be justifiable.

Glenn Contrarian

Baronius –

You’re still stuck on Michael Moore? Well, let’s look at your reference, which lists a series of points made in the movie:

1) The Bin Laden family (if not exactly Osama himself) had a close if convoluted business relationship with the Bush family, through the Carlyle Group.

Is this not factual? If you’ll check, the ties between the Bush family and the House of Saud go back to somewhere around World War ONE.

2) Saudi capital in general is a very large element of foreign investment in the United States.

4) The Bush administration sent far too few ground troops to Afghanistan and thus allowed far too many Taliban and al-Qaida members to escape.

Perhaps you should remember that your reference was published in 2004…and NOW we have the hindsight to see quite easily that if Bush DID send enough troops, he shot himself (and America) in the foot by taking much of the support that would have helped us in Afghanistan and instead used it for his illegal invasion and occupation of Iraq.

5) The Afghan government, in supporting the coalition in Iraq, was purely risible in that its non-army was purely American.

As far as I can tell, this is quite true.

6) The American lives lost in Afghanistan have been wasted. (This I divine from the fact that this supposedly “antiwar” film is dedicated ruefully to all those killed there, as well as in Iraq.)

Remember, this article was written SIX YEARS AGO and we’re STILL losing American lives in our occupation of Afghanistan.

So I read the REST of the article which the writer spends defending the Bush invasion of Iraq. Of course, in 2004 it was not commonly accepted yet that NO, there were no WMD’s prior to the invasion, that NO, Iraq posed no clear and present danger to America, and that NO, Iraq did NOT have any ties whatsoever with al-Qaeda (who hated Saddam Hussein almost as much as they hate Iran (who they DO hate more than America, according to their once-number-two man Zarkawi)).

“From the very beginning, there was a conviction, that Saddam Hussein was a bad person and that he needed to go,” says O’Neill, who adds that going after Saddam was topic “A” 10 days after the inauguration – eight months before Sept. 11.

“From the very first instance, it was about Iraq. It was about what we can do to change this regime,” says Suskind. “Day one, these things were laid and sealed.”

As treasury secretary, O’Neill was a permanent member of the National Security Council. He says in the book he was surprised at the meeting that questions such as “Why Saddam?” and “Why now?” were never asked.

“It was all about finding a way to do it. That was the tone of it. The president saying ‘Go find me a way to do this,’” says O’Neill. “For me, the notion of pre-emption, that the U.S. has the unilateral right to do whatever we decide to do, is a really huge leap.”

And that came up at this first meeting, says O’Neill, who adds that the discussion of Iraq continued at the next National Security Council meeting two days later.

He got briefing materials under this cover sheet. “There are memos. One of them marked, secret, says, ‘Plan for post-Saddam Iraq,’” adds Suskind, who says that they discussed an occupation of Iraq in January and February of 2001.

SO WHY DID WE INVADE IRAQ, Baronius? Hm? Well over a TRILLION dollars and thousands of American lives…just to satisfy Dubya’s lust for military adventure. Next time, try using references that are either not outdated or otherwise not easily disproven…because your reference fails epically on both counts.

(oh, silly me – there I go giving FACTS again. I keep forgetting that you guys really don’t care about the facts….)

Baronius

Oh, Glenn. You’re seeing a pattern where none exists. As the Slate article points out, some of those facts implicate the Saudis in a conspiracy, but others indicate that Bush acted against the interest of the Saudi government. They form different, mutually-exclusive stories. The only reason they’d be presented together is an effort to throw everything possible against Bush and see what sticks. The facts of WWI-era finances, for example, don’t tell us anything about 9/11. The president could have wanted a war to go against his family, wanted a war to support his family, or found himself facing a war that happened to overlap with his family.

John Wilson

This is wrong: “O’Keefe put credits at the beginning and end of his videos, in which he danced around as a pimp. That’s all.”

No, that’s not all.

He overdubbed the live audio where he asked questions with STUDIO recorded audio asking different and incriminating questions.

The over-dubbing is PAINFULLY obvious! It can be detected even by an amateur by the background noise. A more sophisticated auditor finds the abrupt changes in the audio power spectrum, but that is probably beyond your skills and abilities.

I have never said “it would be justifiable.” I said one can understand the reaction. That’s not quite the same thing, and you know it.

http://handyfilm.blogspot.com handyguy

Glenn, I think Michael Moore is cool, but his movies are not purely ‘factual’ and not intended to be. They are propaganda, and more or less open about being such. ‘Propaganda’ doesn’t mean fictional or deceptive, just that he’s expressing an opinion, with little interest in ‘fairness.’

“Sicko,” his movie on healthcare, has some wonderful moments, like when he goes to the “Payments Window” at a hospital in the UK and is informed that it is a window for patients to receive payments, not make them, since no one has to pay — or when a French person he is interviewing looks at him pityingly in near-disbelief as he describes the greed-based American system. It’s really effective.

But listing a bunch of “facts” from his movies and trying to defend them is a purposeless exercise, and you’ll probably just give Baronius more pointless ammunition. And so it will go, back and forth.

http://jeanniedanna.wordpress.com/ jeannie danna

This article is not a referendum on Micheal Moore…get back to the facts.

The media has for the most part, except for Democracy__now! IMO, been sold to the highest bidder.

Perhaps because homeopathy is a bunch of hooey and can be scientifically demonstrated to be so.

Cannonshop

The scientific method, being a process of Elimination doesn’t ‘prove’ much, it simply disproves assertions.

A lot of Homeopathy is so individualized it can’t even be Tested scientifically-which puts the claims of backers of Homeopathic treatment in the same class as philosophers and Theologoians, Jeannie.

http://jeanniedanna.wordpress.com/ jeannie danna

Doc,

There is something to be said for natural herbology not just weed I suspect that if enough people were to try alternative medicine then there would be a lot of unused, boozbar.

:)cuts into their business.

Glenn Contrarian

Handy –

I think you would agree that any errors on Moore’s part do not even begin to hold a candle to what Glenn Beck has done and continues to do (though Baronius apparently can’t see the difference). It’s like I’ve said so many times before – it’s a matter of degree, and the BC conservatives (like most of those on the Right) seem to think that incident A committed by the Left means that the Right isn’t so bad when they commit A, B, C, D, E, F, G, H…you get the idea.

The best example is voter fraud – I’ve issued a challenge many times to the conservatives who railed about voter registration fraud by ACORN to provide ANY proof that even ONE fraudulent vote was cast because of the voter registration fraud committed by a few of ACORN’s food soldiers…and I said I would match proof of every single such fraudulent vote with proof of at least one thousand registered voters wrongfully disenfranchised by Republican (and conservative) voter-caging.

As you can imagine, no takers. They can’t find a SINGLE fraudulent vote cast due to the sins of ACORN’s foot soldiers, and I’m quite ready to back up my claim about the thousands of registered voters wrongfully disenfranchised by the GOP and GOP supporters.

Go check out the the Brad Blog – the scale of Republican hypocrisy while they rail about Democratic voter fraud is nothing short of breathtaking.

http://jeanniedanna.wordpress.com/ jeannie danna

Glenn,

The Brad Blog link is broken.

Baronius

Glenn, you do know that there are conservative sites that chronicle liberal falsehoods, right?

http://blogcritics.org/writers/realist Realist

You are wasting your time, Glenn. Those whose falsehoods you decry would attempt to argue with the Grim reaper when he comes calling to claim their sorry souls.

http://handyfilm.blogspot.com handyguy

…you do know that there are conservative sites that chronicle liberal falsehoods, right?

As there should be. It’s great to get all exaggerations, partial truths and outright lies into the sunlight.

It is disheartening that after how thoroughly several of his most high-profile postings have been discredited, Breitbart still gets cited as an authoritative source by lots of people on here and elsewhere.

If anyone, right or left, uses half-truth, innuendo, and caricature to “prove” something, of course they should be called on it.

It doesn’t matter which “team” has the most fouls. Bogus is bogus. Base your arguments on real information.

If you can’t, maybe consider changing your argument?

zingzing

baronius: “O’Keefe put credits at the beginning and end of his videos, in which he danced around as a pimp. That’s all.”

you don’t even believe that.

http://blogcritics.org/writers/dr-dreadful/ Dr Dreadful

Jeannie,

Herbology and homeopathy are not the same thing.

And the main problem with homeopathy is that in order for it to work, the laws of physics have to be wrong.

Baronius

Breitbart is an angry blogger with ADD. If you understand what you’re dealing with, his sites are pretty good. I think he messed up the Sherrod story (like I said, I wasn’t following it) but the ACORN story was genuine, quality investigative journalism – and yes, I do believe that. He raised legitimate doubt about the John Lewis n-word story, and probably helped break the Journo List story.

Breitbart’s a visionary, and that’s not always a compliment. He’s committed to exposing the way the media steers the narrative. He’ll either crash and burn, switch sides, or succeed, and it’s going to be interesting to watch either way.

zingzing

baronius: “and yes, I do believe that”

then you are a fool. it was an obvious political hack job and he deserves to be sued, at which time he’ll either have to admit what he did or he’ll have to lie in court.

“He’s committed to exposing the way the media steers the narrative.”

yes he is. you realize this, yet you actually believe the resulting story when he shows you how easy it is to manipulate the media and the less intelligent among us. come on. use your brain.

“it’s going to be interesting to watch either way.”

in order to watch it, you should try opening your eyes.

http://handyfilm.blogspot.com handyguy

…the ACORN story was genuine, quality investigative journalism – and yes, I do believe that.

Good grief.

The thing is, Acorn was about empowering poor people, who are so often powerless in this country. They helped with housing, with organizing communities, with voter registration. Their petitions and protests rubbed people the wrong way: too socialistic, too hostile to the rich and powerful.

But it had never been a central accusation against them that they gave questionable ‘small business’ advice to pimps and hookers.

So even if the O’Keefe tapes weren’t utterly phony and bogus [and yes, I believe that], what did they “prove”? Nothing at all about all the good work Acorn had been doing for years.

Shame on the Democrats who backed fearfully away from this faked “scandal” instead of calling it what it was. The right hated Acorn because of their community activism, not because of pimps and hookers. The organization’s enemies were just looking for an excuse and “proof” that their demonization was justified.

We’re still waiting.

Baronius

Handy, you’re talking about policing. I don’t think it does much good for one ideology to police another. (I think we’ve talked about this before.) There are only a few accepted neutral parties that can clarify any particular issue. That puts a great deal of burden on each side to police itself, which is something people should do anyway, but it isn’t easy for everyone. How do you assess the left’s ability to catch its own errors?

http://handyfilm.blogspot.com handyguy

#63: what a crock.

Not everyone is as partisan and tunnel-visioned as you.

We all have brains. We can evaluate the evidence by using said gray matter.

I said it was fine for observers, right or left, to point out bogus “evidence” and arguments, whatever its source. It’s not a matter of some official neutral body. Ludicrous.

If you’re going to accept a discredited “proof” just because you agree with the politics of the person making the false assertion, then you are just pitiful. No hope for you.

But it seems to me that for whatever reason you want to pretend to be that obtuse. Quite nonsensical and purposeless.

http://jeanniedanna.wordpress.com/ jeannie danna

Thanks Doc, Homeopathy comes from a Greek word meaning “like cures like”. Thus, the term Homeopathic technically refers only to medicines or remedies which are in their diluted form, prepared in the manner that Hanneman used. Homeopathy has been improperly used to refer to the broader term natural medicine.

Herbology refers to the science of the study of herbs or plants which are used for medicinal purposes. Most of these herbs can be used in the form of tablets, capsules, teas, herbal liquid tinctures or solid extracts. It is best to find products which are standardized to contain the active principles of that particular herb in order to be assured that it will be effective.

that’s really interesting to know.

Baronius

Handy, I wasn’t being hostile. I was raising an issue that we’ve talked about before, the need for honesty on the internet. The only reason I can think of for your reaction is that you thought I meant “policing” in an official, legally-sanctioned sense. Otherwise, you’ve mistaken a conversation for an attack.

http://www.maskedmoviesnobs.com El Bicho

“Breitbart’s a visionary”

What vision does it take to work as an intern for Drudge and then go out on your own doing a similar thing?

http://handyfilm.blogspot.com handyguy

In between, interestingly, Breitbart helped start Huffington Post. And he is more or less reasonable on gay rights. That’s the extent of favorable things I know about him.

Cannonshop

#64 “If you’re going to accept a discredited “proof” just because you agree with the politics of the person making the false assertion, then you are just pitiful. No hope for you.”

hence, why SOME of us treated the “acorn” videos as questionable, didn’t buy into the West Texas thing immediately, and don’t believe the Birthers, Troothers, or other fantasies of the radically obsessed.

However, not buying into conspiracy theories or goofball assertions that break with observed realities (or, in at least one case, the laws of physics) does not in turn mean open-armed embrace of equally silly allegations from the other side.

For instance, while I do not think that Barack Hussein Obama is a plant from some islamist jihadist secret society in league with bilderbergers, trilateral commissions, space aliens or the Mob, I do think he is a chicago hack whose entire resume fits neatly into a single paragraph, and I wonder how in hell he managed to get elected when his last successful venture (beyond writing two autobiographies) occurred as a dependent student attending Harvard-about the time I was a little kid.

Looking at his record in terms of job performance, I can’t claim much confidence in him as president, and lo-and-behold, turns out he’s as underwhelming a president as he was a Community Organizer or Legislator-only difference being that he can’t claim that someone in authority above him is preventing him from achieving all the miracles he claims to have achieved. (Still waiting for people to roll into actual JOBS instead of just off the Unemployment rolls when their bennies run out…)

he’s the first president of hte United States I’ve seen in my lifetime that makes Carter look good in comparison, and that’s pretty bad-He’s actually made me wistful for Bush (Senior! whom I voted against in ’92, OR Junior, and you have to screw up BAD to make Junior look good…)

Do I think he’s corrupt? WELL…

he’s from Chicago. He’s a politician. He wasn’t crushed by the Chicago Machine of Mayor Daley. Hells yes he’s corrupt, nothing he’s done in office (any office) has led me to any other conclusion.

Do I think he’s the antichrist? I don’t BELIEVE in the Antichrist. He’s this guy, who talks well when he’s got a script, means well, and hasn’t a fucking clue how to DO well…but he owes too much to The Party to have much chance of experimenting with anything The Party (meaning the bosses of the Party, not the rank-and-file) hasn’t already vetted and approved.

And unlike Bush, who had largely the same problem, the Democrats have been driving OUT the Libertarian wing for the last thirty years or so, so he’s basically a statist puppet in service to the kind of apparatchiks that tend to make anywhere they settle in to ‘help’ into a hell-hole of monumental and shocking proportions.

This is what I surmise after looking at his actions, comparing them to his words, and examining his resume.

Other people have a different take, they like it, it’s their thing. Glenn’s an extreme example of this-but then, it’s to be expected, he’s a total “Party Man” and “The Party” can do no wrong in his eyes.

Dan

“then you are a fool. it was an obvious political hack job and he deserves to be sued, at which time he’ll either have to admit what he did or he’ll have to lie in court.”—zingzing

That’s how you know that the tapes aren’t an “obvious hack job”. No one has sued or is planning to sue based on any “deceptive editing”.

You people are Keerraaaazzzy! What do your therapists have to say about these delusional Breitbart denial fantasys.

Same thing with Shirley Sherrod. Her

zingzing

um, dan… he was sued for the acorn incident. go look it up. in order to get the unedited tapes, the prosecutors had to promise criminal immunity to o’keefe and giles. remember that?

Dan

Sherrods expose’ was shown in full context. She details her “redemptive” change of heart from oppressing poor white people in Breitbarts original video. It’s all there. Why do you pretend it’s out of context?

She’ll drop her proposed lawsuit because she doesn’t have a leg to stand on. Although she has had a lot of success in the frivolous lawsuit arena before.

Dan

umm, zing, no he hasn’t been. The appropriation of the tapes was to investigate ACORN.

zingzing

um, yes he has. just google it. acorn (and workers) sued breitbart, o’keefe and giles in sept 2009 in baltimore and just last month, o’feefe and giles were sued again in california. you can be damn sure that breitbart’s name will come up at that trial as well. and what may have started as an investigation of acorn soon turned into an investigation of the filmmakers, which is why the filmmakers wanted criminal immunity.

as for the sherrod video, you really must have troubles with “context” if you think it’s not out of context. how was the video originally presented, dan?

Glenn Contrarian

Baronius –

Glenn, you do know that there are conservative sites that chronicle liberal falsehoods, right?

Of course there are – it was either in my article or in my first or second comment that I said to take ALL those sites, add up ALL the falsehoods exposed by ABC, CBS, NBC, MSNBC, and CNN…and the total would STILL be far less than the more than four THOUSAND inaccuracies/distortions/lies broadcast on the Fox News channel since November 2004. Once more, it’s a matter of degree, and the BC conservatives (like most of those on the Right) seem to think that incident A committed by the Left means that the Right isn’t so bad when they commit A, B, C, D, E, F, G, H….

And btw – did you happen to notice the link I provided showing that even BREITBART admitted that the O’Keefe videos were a hoax? Don’t click that link, because you just might wind up questioning the illusions that you seem to hold so dear.

Dan

zingzing, I realize this is difficult for you to sort out, but the lawsuits you reference are not for any deceptive editing. They are for recording people without their knowledge or consent.

You see, even if people are doing something terribly wrong, like facilitating child prostitution, you still are not allowed to catch them by secretly recording them. That is why the workers were only fired, and the organization was only defunded.

But, not to worry, they received their funding only because they were “non-partisan”. So all of their phony vote rigging and siphoning of tax dollars helped Republicans as much as Democrats. So It’s a wash right? Riiiiiight.

But let’s not be sidetracked, it will help you heal. So now that you have been informed about what the lawsuits are about, do you see how the media that has been informing you misled you instead— to believe the tapes were “heavily edited” to wrongfully impugn “innocent” acorn workers.

How does that make you feel about the motives of those media outlets? Are you angry about being misinformed?

As far as the sherrod video. I’ve already said the context is all there. Why would Breitbart include her redemptive statements if he were trying to damage her. He could have stopped with the NAACP audience expressions of support for Shirleys past discriminatory practices against whites. That would have made the point he set out to make, which was targeted at the NAACP’s racism. If anything, it could be said he protected Sherrods reputation by including the redemptive change of heart remarks.

http://handyfilm.blogspot.com handyguy

Dan continues to make claims about the Sherrod video that even Breitbart has let go of.

She was telling a story about redemption. She explained why she might have had reason to hang on to racial animus [crosses burning on your lawn tend to do that to a person, especially after white grand juries fail to indict anyone for your father’s murder]. And she talked about the importance of overcoming that animus, moving beyond it.

It was a beautiful, deeply moving speech. Even Ann fucking Coulter praised it as an amazing speech — on Sean Hannity’s show! I’ve probably never agreed with her before and and probably won’t often in the future.

I don’t know what Dan’s personal equivalent of crosses burning on his lawn is, but something deep down must be driving him — unlike Shirley Sherrod, his animus is still front and center in every mean-spirited post.

Hope you find your own redemption soon, bud.

http://handyfilm.blogspot.com handyguy

And I’m not going to claim that neutral and liberal observers have a more accurate sense of hearing than Breitbart worshippers.

But several news outlets have played the segments of the tape allegedly containing “cheering” by NAACP audience members as Sherrod describes her interactions with white farmers.

No one, other than Dan and maybe Mr Breitbart, hears “cheering.”

What you hear is “uh-huh,” and some mild chuckling. Most people have interpreted this as being akin to the “call and response” from a congregation reacting to a black preacher, and/or a bit of self-recognition: “Uh huh, I have been there and I understand what you are talking about, and you are speaking the Truth. Tell it!”

But the reaction gets noticeably stronger when Mrs. Sherrod talks about her moment of epiphany: she wasn’t fighting for black vs. white. She was advocating for the poor of all colors, not for a race. That was what her job was about.

Then the audience claps, and maybe cheers a little.

This is not just a difference of opinion. It’s an accurate description of the tape.

Dan

handyguy once again stalks nearly every post I contribute with personal denigrating invective, yet charges that I am the mean spirited one.

If sorting the facts from leftist lies is mean spirited, then I’ll be happy to be considered as such. Bud.

Dan

“This is not just a difference of opinion. It’s an accurate description of the tape.”—handyguy

Oh, well then, I guess if this isn’t just your opinion, then that settles it.

zingzing

dan, the california case may rest on unlawful taping, but the editing of the tapes has and will come up. the ca ag found the tapes to be “significantly edited.” breitbart’s not a part of that case (as of yet, and the names of several co-defendants have yet to be released), but the filmmakers are getting sued. i just hope breitbart is next.

supposedly, prosecutors in maryland are again considering indicting all three. as of july 21st, papers appear to have been filed.

Baronius

BC is unstable today. I just lost a comment.

“And btw – did you happen to notice the link I provided showing that even BREITBART admitted that the O’Keefe videos were a hoax?”

Glenn, you’re spreading falsehoods about that Media Matters article. It links to a transcript of an interview with Breitbart, in which he talks about the title sequence of the ACORN videos. He doesn’t “admit” to anything. Dan’s right. Like Dan, I await your apology.

Dan

Ditto on the proposed maryland prosecution. The charges are being considered for violating the Wiretapping and Electronic Surveiliance Act.

I guess prosecutors can find nothing on the books that pertains to conspiracy to cover up child sex slavery.

http://blogcritics.org/writers/dr-dreadful/ Dr Dreadful

Dan’s tone and general position has for some time been reminding me of a white supremacist who used to post here: Richard something. Can’t remember his last name.

Just an observation.

Baronius

Dread, that’s called “poisoning the well”.

http://blogcritics.org/writers/dr-dreadful/ Dr Dreadful

Not intended as such, Herr Baron. I really was simply making an observation. Just that sometimes one reads echoes of commenters past.

As a matter of fact, Richard – Brodie, that was his name – was upfront about his beliefs (obnoxious as I and most others here found them) and argued them coherently and with integrity. He was a challenging commenter, as Dan is, even though I found his views and general demeanour unpleasant, as I generally do Dan’s.

http://handyfilm.blogspot.com handyguy

Sorry I hurt Mr Thin-Skin’s feelings. Some apparently can dish it out but can’t take it.

At any rate, my intent was not really personal. I’m just continually aghast at the invective he employs against the undeserving Shirley Sherrod and against anyone who questions the integrity of his Great Lord Breitbart, whose shit apparently doth not stink.

I will continue to answer his silly but, yes, mean-spirited puffery as it deserves to be answered.

And it’s hard not to notice, Dan, that you never directly respond to any points I make. Afraid you’ll lose the argument?

Baronius

Handy, what’s with you? You’re being belligerant lately. On top of that, you’re misunderstanding half the comments I make, and I don’t remember having that problem with you before.

[1] In anticipation of the [joyous] California same-sex-marriage ruling today, Fox News has been “reporting” that the judge is gay and should have recused himself.

[2] The disingenuous disinformation campaign about the president’s country of birth has paid off for the cynical, amoral creeps who push it every chance they get.

Just in time for the president’s 49th birthday today, a new poll says that only 42% of Americans — and a startling 23% of Republicans — believe “Pres. Obama was definitely born in the US.” As Chris Matthews pointed out today with typical subtlety, it’s The Big Lie in action.

Perhaps some Republicans answering the poll just enjoyed saying something snarky about the president, whether they actually believe it or not.

doug m

By Fox’s “logic”, how could a heterosexual judge not recuse themselves in the case?

Nice to see equality triumphant over ignorance.

Cannonshop

Who cares about “Equality”? seriously, the whole idea of banning Gay Divorce is silly. (Flipside of marraige, Divorce, which is tougher than just moving out and taking your stuff…nice to see the other side gets to experience legal harassment when their relationships go sour for a change…)

The silliness is the idea that Society should be sanctioning “Marraige” at All. It should be between two people, with only interest in the courts coming if there are kids involved. (Not the way it really works, unfortunately, but maybe all this circus antics about “Gay” marraige can put some wedges to end this state meddling in people’s personal lives on THAT front…)

Anyway, the ruling looks like good law-at least, in today’s statist, meddling, nanny-society.

Dan

“…against anyone who questions the integrity of his Great Lord Breitbart, whose shit apparently doth not stink.”—handyguy

Finally, you’ve at least written something mildly humorous before doggedly resuming your obsession with all things gay. If this is one of those “points” you claim I don’t respond to, I’ll just say It’s not likely, although proper dietary habits help.

Dr Dreadful, I sort of remembered Richard Brodie too. I googled him and blog critics. From a quick glance over, you’re right, we are sort of similar. Interesting and astute observation.

Baronius, there is an interesting article about how Chris Matthews scrubbed a 5 o’clock show and did a highly unusual retaping because he accidentaly made an honest observation about how Shirley Sherrods redemptive remarks were, in fact, included in the original Breitbart video, contrary to the lie being hammered that the video was edited to make her appear racist. If you google “Who got to Chris Matthews? memory hole” it comes up in several of the top lines.

Even Fox news hasn’t been clear on the deception, except for Brit Hume, who gave the truth of the matter a somewhat less than prominent mention on the Sunday show.

I kind of cringe when liberals use the ‘well, both sides of media are equally dishonest’ fallback argument to justify their blatantly overt, and intelligence insulting deceptions. Before accepting the premise that Breitbart has ever, even once, done something deceptive, I need evidence.

Just as with Rush, Coulter etc. As more and more lies to sully their reputations are revealed, the obviousness of their character and integrity is more firmly established.

As you’ve noted though, the tendancy for Glenn and zing etc. is just to plow ahead, robot like, moving on to the next false assertion they’ve been fooled to accept.

Baronius

Well, Coulter just goes out of her way to say inflammatory things.

But Limbaugh is a great example. Remember when he tried to buy into the Rams? There were a bunch of false comments attributed to him, and the business deal fell apart. There were also some real quotes, but they were taken out of context. For example, he was talking about the lack of sportsmanship in the NFL, and said that teams were looking like the Crips and Bloods. That’s not racist, but it was depicted that way.

…the tendancy [sic] for Glenn and zing etc. is just to plow ahead, robot like, moving on to the next false assertion they’ve been fooled to accept.

Mr. Pot, may I introduce Mr. Kettle.

http://handyfilm.blogspot.com handyguy

Dan admits that a ‘white supremacist’ commenter cited by Doc is indeed like-minded. A blinding flash of self-awareness threatens to illuminate all those dark, creepy, racially charged posts.

PS Although I certainly am gay, and proudly so, I am not “obsessed with all things gay,” but rather with all commenters who are overtly or covertly homophobic. Try me. I’ll demonstrate. Baronius thinks I’ve been belligerent lately? You ain’t seen nothin’ yet, baby.

http://blogcritics.org/writers/dr-dreadful/ Dr Dreadful

I kind of cringe when liberals use the ‘well, both sides of media are equally dishonest’ fallback argument to justify their blatantly overt, and intelligence insulting deceptions.

As I’ve already said, this is true of both sides. Examples are abundant, especially from Fox News.

Before accepting the premise that Breitbart has ever, even once, done something deceptive, I need evidence.

This one reminds me of the creationist who demands to see evidence for evolution, then, when it is presented to him, waits until he thinks people will have forgotten that it was provided and then demands to see evidence for evolution.

Cannonshop

#98 I’m left wondering what psychic power you’ve got, Handy, that lets you identify if someone is “Covertly” Anything. Esp. over the internet, where you can’t even watch their reactions.

Seriously, that kind of ability (the ability to read minds) is worth money, especially if you don’t have to be in the same room with the target…

B: “the tendancy for Glenn and zing etc. is just to plow ahead, robot like, moving on to the next false assertion they’ve been fooled to accept.”

the power of delusions at work.

Baronius

Handy, that’s funny. You cut-and-pasted a list of Limbaugh quotes out of context, one of which I’d given the context for in the previous message. That seems like the kind of rote repetition of accusations that you’d usually denounce.

http://handyfilm.blogspot.com handyguy

The first two bits came from my own memory and I tracked down the quotes; the rest from a widely distributed web list. But all of them are annotated on the link I provide; feel free to tell us why they are meaningless rather than just yelling “out of context” as if that proves it.

And in context or out of context, Rush is a repeat-offender provocateur on the subject of race; it’s an envelope and set of buttons he likes to push. He knows it, you know it, Dan knows it.

http://handyfilm.blogspot.com handyguy

Cannon #100:
I have in mind more the people here and elsewhere who deny being bigots but can’t help letting traces of anti-gay bias [or simple ignorance] slip through in their comments.

But actually, more often in the Wild West of the interwebs, the hostility is overt. And it gets me pretty steamed. I’m waiting for this kind of stuff to start rearing its ugly head on the Prop 8 threads.

zingzing

baronius, if you can give the context for all those up there and rush actually doesn’t come off as exactly what he sounds like in the context-free quotes, i’d be surprised. that said, context is important. i’d really like to see what point he’s really trying to make with the liquor store quote. fantastic stuff, that.

(apparently he said it after spike lee suggested that black children skip school, watch malcolm x and learn their own history.) (that doesn’t really explain it though… or at least he still sounds like a racist prick for having said it.)

Baronius

Making fun of the NAACP isn’t the same thing as being racist. They’ve become just another partisan voice, and certainly one that doesn’t speak for all black people. They’re fair game, aren’t they?

zingzing

sure, but don’t put it in such racist terms.

Zedd

Great article.

I think the bigger questions are:

1. What do they get out of believing as they do?

2. What do these lies validate for them?

If we can answer those questions we can figure out how to get them back on track. These individuals do need to be “re-educated”. Their stalled intellectual state is costing the nation a great deal. Americans are thought to be dense and unevolved, world over. Corporations and the wealthy believe that they can can pull a fast one on us , at will (so the economy and the welfare of the public is in jeopardy). Politicians are fully aware of the malaise and use that to their advantage, to continue their habit of faux legislating; hanging out in Washington doing busy work but coming up with no real solutions. The media itself, (liberal, conservative, and middle of the road), believes itself to be far above the masses intellectually and no longer bothers to address the issues that matter because they believe that we wont get it (because there is no flag, or star or other poorly imagined, cheesy dash of imagery thrown into the discussion).

http://handyfilm.blogspot.com handyguy

Disingenuousness, thy name is Baronius.

You could probably do better than that.
“Fair game” to associate the NAACP with riots and liquor store robberies?

And is it fair game to nod supportively to birthers on the president’s birthday? You’ve claimed in the past that birthers have no place in any legit, intelligent conservative discussion — that they are fringe elements. Doesn’t that affect your opinion of Rush even a little?

http://handyfilm.blogspot.com handyguy

Posting this for its jaw-dropping entertainment value, not to “prove” Breitbart is a racist. It’s a funny, mind-boggling profile on MediaMatters about Kevin Pezzi, who posted some unpleasant musings about Shirley Sherrod on Breitbart’s site and was rewarded with an invitation to write for the Great Lord Andrew.

“These individuals do need to be “re-educated”. Their stalled intellectual state is costing the nation a great deal.”

OK, I want to guess Mao, but it’s too obvious. Pol Pot, maybe?

http://handyfilm.blogspot.com handyguy

Great profile in Mother Jones of Bob Inglis, the conservative SC congressman who lost his primary after, among other things, provoking the ire of Glenn Beck supporters and suggesting that some of their intently held beliefs are not factual. I’m sure I disagree with him on many issues, but he’s rapidly moving up my most-admired list.

In case you don’t read that whole article, here’s the funniest/scariest passage [there are several!]:

Shortly before the runoff primary election, Inglis met with about a dozen tea party activists at the modest ranch-style home of one of them. Here’s what took place:

I sat down, and they said on the back of your Social Security card, there’s a number. That number indicates the bank that bought you when you were born based on a projection of your life’s earnings, and you are collateral. We are all collateral for the banks.

I have this look like, “What the heck are you talking about?” I’m trying to hide that look and look clueless. I figured clueless was better than argumentative.

So they said, “You don’t know this?! You are a member of Congress, and you don’t know this?!”

Zedd

Baronious,

I used that terminology (re-educate) on purpose. I was baiting.

You see at some point you have to stop being so reactionary. How you responded is EXACTLY what perpetuates DUMB in America. If people are ignorant, they do need to be educated. They just do. However what happens is, instead of focusing on educating people, folks like yourself get caught up in imagery -“that sounds like Mao, so its gotta be bad (oh I can just see the bombs coming and the Jesus deniers taking over the planet)”, and nothing gets done. Nothing in Washington, with Wall Street, in the schools, NOTHING. We are held prisoner, hostage by your Attention Deficit Disorder reactions to important matters.

Oh look a flag… fetch… good boy… there there. Better now?

Baronius

So, you wrote something crazy, I pointed it out, and you agreed with me…boy, you really…tricked me?

Dan

“As I’ve already said, this is true of both sides. Examples are abundant, especially from Fox News”—Dr. Dreadful

Except they always seem to turn out to be lies, just as I’ve demonstrated in the case of Breitbart. I know you THINK what you think. Repeating the assertion over and over doesn’t make it true.

I’m reminded too of how evolutionists misrepresent the arguments of intelligent design. When they’re not hiding from them by ridiculing straw men “creationists”.

handy #96, seriously, what point is served by this silly “insensitivity” list? Are you confusing insensitivity with honesty? You are certainly gay, in more ways than simple sexual interest, if you think your threat of increased belligerence causes me any concern other than the forcing of milk through my nose from the unexpected surge of laughter.

zinzing #101, Delusions? you were just schooled on your ignorant belief that Breitbart was/is being sued over deceptive editing of tapes by ACORN. I assume by your silence on the matter that you realize now that you were wrong. Anyone else bothering to read this thread realizes it also. Whatever “the power of delusion” now means coming from you on this thread is

Dan

…likely nothing to be concerned with.

Baronius, I was kind of hoping you checked out the Chris Matthews redo. It’s another interesting incident of organized corruption in liberal media.

http://blogcritics.org/writers/dr-dreadful/ Dr Dreadful

Except they always seem to turn out to be lies, just as I’ve demonstrated in the case of Breitbart.

Dan, your position is untenable. For you to be right, there would have to be some mechanism which renders right-wingers naturally infallible, which is absurd.

You would also have to show that each and every alleged Fox News distortion or misrepresentation – I can’t seem to track down Glenn’s “list of 4000″, but it’s a trivial matter to find a whole bunch of examples with a simple Google search – is actually true.

Dan

If my position were that right-wingers are infallible, then it would be untenable. It is not.

http://takeitorleaveit.typepad.com/ roger nowosielski

Baronius’ thinking Handy is becoming belligerent of late is prompted by one reason and one reason only. It’s Baronius himself who is quickly joining the ranks of the obnoxious. And when one becomes obnoxious, there’s only one thing to do: call ’em out.

http://blogcritics.org/writers/dr-dreadful/ Dr Dreadful

I’m reminded too of how evolutionists misrepresent the arguments of intelligent design

I said nothing about intelligent design.

When they’re not hiding from them by ridiculing straw men “creationists”.

If my position were that right-wingers are infallible, then it would be untenable. It is not.

Yet you refuse to concede the validity of any such charges presented here.

http://handyfilm.blogspot.com handyguy

If Dan thinks Limbaugh’s ridiculous and offensive quotes are just examples of honesty, then that says a lot about Dan.

This brick-wall defense, or offense, of pretending that everything your opponent says is mistaken [without for a moment being able to prove that] and that everything you parrot from Limbaugh and Breitbart is fine and dandy and fully vetted and “honest” — well, it’s not a way to have an argument even, much less a conversation.

It can be summarized as, “I’m right, you’re wrong, shut up. Because you’re on the opposing team, your ideas are automatically invalid and I’m not even going to listen.”

Of course no one can “win” an argument with you, because there is no actual back-and-forth, just hostility and heavy breathing.

“You are certainly gay, in more ways than simple sexual interest…”

Such a charming turn of phrase! You must make lots of friends that way. Oh, and sorry about causing your milk-drinking accident. Did you ruin your Dittohead t-shirt?

Baronius

Dan – I really wasn’t following the story at the time, so I don’t remember the sequence of events. I don’t know what Chris Matthews knew or when he knew it.

Handy – Dan pointed out that Media Matters lied about Breitbart. Now you’re using Media Matters as a source about Breitbart’s supposed lying. What am I supposed to think of their fact-checking standards, or of yours?

http://handyfilm.blogspot.com handyguy

Dan claimed/asserted that MediaMatters lied — that hardly makes it so. I think they’re a valuable site. They are not infallible. But ‘they’ are not all one writer, and not every story/circumstance is the same.

I posted that link as an amusing anecdote about an eccentric character. Perhaps you didn’t bother to read it. All the crazy shit came directly from this guy’s own web site and Facebook postings. As I said, I wasn’t trying to ‘prove’ anything, I just thought it was funny, his Neanderthal racial attitudes aside.

Dan

“Yet you refuse to concede the validity of any such charges presented here”

give me a valid charge and I’ll concede it.

“If Dan thinks Limbaugh’s ridiculous and offensive quotes are just examples of honesty, then that says a lot about Dan.”

I don’t know why anyone would call the quotes examples of honesty. The point I was making is that honesty, or the lack of it, is what was being discussed before you decided to post the irrelevant quotes.

That is why I said you seem to confuse honesty with sensitivity.

If I were to likewise attempt to confuse the discussion and project some demonization your way, I might point out that the ACORN workers you share affinity with conspired to facilitate child sex slavery.

Baronius, The link I referenced shows Matthews arguing with Howard Dean that Breitbart showed the sherrod tape in full context with the redemptive remarks. Then it shows the later episode after someone has apparently told Matthews not to be so honest. Dean is gone in the re-taped episode, probably to another appointment, and another Breitbart bashing liberal takes his place.

Zedd

Baronius,

You cant be that dim. Re-read and maybe you will get it. You totally missed it. Totally.

zingzing

you’d have to be a fucking moron to still think breitbart was being honest. and i don’t believe any of you are fucking morons. i think you’re just saying that you’re fucking morons in order to build some political bloc.

no one thinks obama is a communist, no one thinks obama was born outside of this country, no one thinks breitbart is an honest journalist. you’re all just making us think you’re fucking morons so we actually think that you actually think this way and that we have to deal with you on this level, right? it’s a fucking joke, isn’t it?

you really don’t think this way, i hope. i hope this is a political strategy. you look like fucking morons, but i hope you’re not. if you were fucking morons, it wouldn’t be this difficult. so this is just a strategy.

well done, conservatives… you look like fucking morons. then again, you always have, so i guess this is just a continuation of your collective, very successful, strategy.

may the fucking morons rue the day. fucking morons…

http://takeitorleaveit.typepad.com/ roger nowosielski

successful, zing, only to the extent you engage the fucking morons. Just let the fucking morons be.

Baronius

Dan – I’ll check it out.

Handy – Follow Glenn’s link to Media Matters, then click on their link to Brad Blog. You’ll see that they’re being dishonest about the story.

http://handyfilm.blogspot.com handyguy

Baronius, you are repetitively stuck arguing with me about a point I never tried to make.

But even if you found half a dozen instances [rather than just one], where MediaMatters exaggerated or misstated a claim of bias, that wouldn’t disqualify them as an information source.

They have written literally thousands of articles about media bias; many are extremely valuable in pointing out deceptions that might otherwise have gone unnoticed.

I absolutely agree that one should never swallow any information source whole, without using your brain.

As I’ve said before, you’re often overly interested in single “gotcha’s” which you then claim prove your case or permanently and completely invalidate a source or an argument.

This may be a fun game for you, but it’s not really about truth-telling. It’s about partisan, adolescent, my-team-is-great-and-yours-sucks rhetoric.

http://handyfilm.blogspot.com handyguy

Not that it will change anyone’s mind, since both pro- and anti-Breitbart arguments seem firmly fixed in concrete by now, but I have found the info below valuable.

These links have probably already appeared. If so, forgive me. I won’t take up much space.

I’m not arguing the point that Glenn made about Breitbart lying; I’m arguing the point that you’re using a source that lied about Breitbart.

“But even if you found half a dozen instances [rather than just one], where MediaMatters exaggerated or misstated a claim of bias, that wouldn’t disqualify them as an information source.

They have written literally thousands of articles about media bias; many are extremely valuable in pointing out deceptions that might otherwise have gone unnoticed.”

You could say the same thing about Andrew Breitbart’s sites, if you wanted to. You clearly don’t want to. You like the conclusions that MediaMatters draws, but not the ones Breitbart draws, and that influences your standards.

BTW, like you, I don’t write articles, and like you, I don’t have much faith that you can change someone’s mind with comments on a thread. If I only show up and pick off a few easy targets, it’s out of the desire to fight falsehoods on the internet as well as the hope that I might encourage someone to begin questioning his positions.

http://handyfilm.blogspot.com handyguy

The story I linked to on on MediaMatters was for entertainment value. It’s funny! I said that at the time, and I have repeated it twice since then. Like talking to a brick wall.

I do think MM serves a valuable purpose. Maybe Breitbart could too. But his most high-profile stories [O’Keefe/Acorn, John Lewis, Shirley Sherrod] happen to be the ones that are tainted. [I realize you disagree.]

I haven’t written as much lately, but I may return if properly motivated.

John Wilson

“Dan” discredits himself when he says: “…I might point out that the ACORN workers you share affinity with conspired to facilitate child sex slavery.”

Not true. The audio on the O’Keefe tapes was obviously doctored to create that appearance.

Baronius

Dan – I watch the videos. I didn’t think there was anything deceptive in the second one.

The first one was an alpha-male train wreck. Dean saw something on Fox that was different from what Matthews saw on Breitbart, and Matthews took that as an insult. The second version was more on-message and professional. Of course, the message was “Breitbart bad”, so that definitely came through more on the second one. But I don’t think there was any misrepresentation.

http://handyfilm.blogspot.com handyguy

I just watched the Hardball tape also. Nothing seems ominous or deceptive, and Joan Walsh correctly points out that only a tiny snippet of “redemptive” material was in the full Breitbart clip, and that Fox, where it got the most initial play, may have shortened it further, omitting the last few seconds [and that may have been for reasons of length, not to be deceptive].

[The clip does show Chris Matthews in his Grouchy Asshole mode, which happens occasionally, not every night. They may have pulled the tape because someone pointed out to him that it made him look bad, being a real shit toward Howard Dean, who was considerably more reasonable.]

I’d also point out that the Breitbart version of the Sherrod tape had horrible audio quality — her voice was both shrill and nearly unintelligible. You had to depend on the subtitles to comprehend it.

When the full tape was later released, the audio quality was much improved. And the full Sherrod narrative, both before and after the Breitbart portion, is what makes it so remarkable and moving.

http://handyfilm.blogspot.com handyguy

John W is correct: the aiding and abetting child slavery charge is severely and maybe entirely undercut by reading the whole transcript. [At least two of the Acorn staffers called the police also; and more than once they point out that what O’Keefe is describing is illegal.]

If you initially watched the tape believing O’Keefe is a clever-if-naughty good guy, and all Acorn staffers are intrinsically evil and potentially criminal, then you probably saw and heard what you wanted to. And it may be hard for you to change your mind about it now, despite evidence to the contrary.

But remember that O’Keefe appeared on Fox shows wearing that ridiculous outfit, and the clear implication was that he had worn it in the Acorn offices, too.

When I first saw the clips, it was hard for me to imagine anyone not laughing at him and throwing him out — how could the Acorn folks be so clueless? But then it turns out O’Keefe actually was dressed like a cleancut college student or accounting intern.

Treating an apparent nut job/naif with polite deference, and aiding and abetting child slavery, are two very different things.

Especially since no child slavery ever took place — it was fictional. And was Acorn associated with prostitution in any way before these stunt tapes? How did O’Keefe come up with that particular scam, and why do right-wingers find it so meaningful? It’s really wacky.

Dan

“Dan – I watch the videos. I didn’t think there was anything deceptive in the second one.”—Baronius

Well, the point is that in the first video Matthews was acknowledging that Breitbart did indeed put sherrods racist remarks in context, which is what everyone is denying. The “deception”, if you want to use that word, is that obviously there was pressure applied to scrap the Dean interview and redo the segment for the rebroadcast, where everyone pretends that the racist remarks are taken out of context.

http://handyfilm.blogspot.com handyguy

“Obviously” only to yourself, Dan.

As I said, I think it’s more because Matthews was so churlish in the first segment, and either he or his producers realized afterward that it made him look really bad.

It also was a breaking story. Hardball runs first at 5:00 and again at 7:00. Usually it’s a straight repeat, but not always.

You a regular viewer? I doubt it. You have any actual behind-the-scenes info from MSNBC? I doubt it.

But hang on to your “obviously” if it makes you feel better.

http://www.maskedmoviesnobs.com El Bicho

“I might point out that the ACORN workers you share affinity with conspired to facilitate child sex slavery.”

You might but you’d be wrong. Are you sure they weren’t trying to get more information to later turn over to police? Or did you see the magic video tape that ran subtitles of what was going on in the ACORN staffers mind?

http://handyfilm.blogspot.com handyguy

Dan prefers to think what Breitbart and Limbaugh tell him to think. Anyone who disagrees is automatically classified as bogus. Life is so much simpler this way.

Baronius

Exactly. We obey everything Breitbart and Limbaugh say because we’re stupid. You guys happen to concur with everything that MSNBC says because you’re so thoughtful.

http://handyfilm.blogspot.com handyguy

See my #112, where I express my admiration for conservative congressman Bob Inglis, and #137, where I call Chris Matthews a Grouchy Asshole.

Find for me any equivalent in Dan’s posts. You yourself have occasionally called conservatives to task for wrong-headedness. But on this thread you conveniently ignore most/all counter-evidence to your narrow interpretation of the sainted Mr Breitbart and the poor, maligned Limbaugh.

Cheap sniping. So was my 142, although it happens to be true.

http://takeitorleaveit.typepad.com/ roger nowosielski

When Baronius sides with a self-proclaimed white supremacist, it says something about his conservatism and state of mind. Both had gone to a deep end.

Baronius

Roger, I don’t think that Dan is a self-proclaimed white supremacist. Dan, would you care to clarify?

http://takeitorleaveit.typepad.com/ roger nowosielski

Well, he virtually identified with another BC poster Dreadful had alluded to. Their posts, by Dan’s own admission, were like a spitting image of one another.

http://handyfilm.blogspot.com handyguy

My guess is that Dan would not, in fact, care to clarify.

Baronius

I recall the conversation, Roger. I think it’s fair to ask for clarification.

http://takeitorleaveit.typepad.com/ roger nowosielski

Since you recall the conversation, Baronius, why do you ask for clarification?

Dan

“Are you sure they weren’t trying to get more information to later turn over to police?”—El bicho

thank you el bicho. You’ve taken blindly devoted absurdity to a new level.

Baronius, no one is ever a “self proclaimed white supremacist”. “White suprmacist” is just a label liberal ninnies throw around to cope with losing arguments. Often arguments that involve racial issues.

A similar example in this thread was when handyguy referenced insensitive rush limbaugh quotes to throw up a cloud of dust over the fact that he can’t produce any true evidence of dishonesty.

The neurological pathways of liberals brains are so frozen in victim mythology, that they cannot process any contradictory evidence. And almost all evidence is contradictory. So all they’re left with is a demonization strategy.

It’s both ugly and sad.

http://takeitorleaveit.typepad.com/ roger nowosielski

How would you describe yourself then in light of your views? And what’s wrong with the label if the description fits. At least have the balls to own up to it if that’s what you really are. Or re-describe yourself.

You’re speaking of labels, yet you yourself readily invoke them just the same. I’m not offended by the liberal term because I ain’t one. I’m a radical, proud to admit it, and in my kind of world you’d be sent to a re-education camp in Novosibirsk. Just kidding. But don’t play the stupid label game, using it on the one hand and then pretending to be offended when the shoe is on the other foot.

Again, show some balls and gain some respect. But your whining makes you look like a weasel. Imagine, Dan speaking of things “ugly” and “sad,” showing compassion I suppose or some heightened sensibility.

Anyway, I wasn’t aware of this trait of your personality, such a sensitive fellow. I’ll make certain to use kids gloves from now on. As a matter of fact, I’m taking back my “white supremacist” epithet. From now on, you’re a humanitarian in my book, Dan. And I sure hope it’ll make you feel better. Certainly wouldn’t want you to think of me as being ugly or to feel sorry for me. See, I’ve just rewired my “neurological pathways” on demand.

Happy dreams.

Baronius

Dan, I think it’s important that we clear this up. Do you believe that Chris Matthews is genetically superior to Tom Sowell? That Ginsburg is a better judge than Thomas? That Eminem is more talented than Hendrix?

(That second one was a trick question, by the way. It turns out that believing that race makes a person a better judge isn’t racist.)

http://handyfilm.blogspot.com handyguy

I wasn’t trying to prove Limbaugh is dishonest, although his broadcasts are more about rhetorical bomb-throwing than facts. I was just demonstrating that he is indisputably an asshole, especially on the subject of race. [It’s quite easy to do; I don’t claim any special abilities.]

The “victim mentality” is not limited to liberals [a term you employ as if it is a fatal mental disease rather than a group of people in a democracy who hold opinions different from yours].

Even when conservatives controlled the White House and both houses of Congress, and even though the highest rated cable news network by far skews way right by anyone’s measure, there were then and still are pitiful claims that the ‘librull meedeeya’ are stacked against the ‘Hard Truths’ offered by the brave but scorned right.

This paranoia is unseemly and absurd. The media bend over backwards in a futile attempt at “fairness” by giving air time to fake non-news, including dumb-dumb tea party rants, the Acorn sting/scam and the alleged racism of Shirley Sherrod and the NAACP.

When some news outlets rightly questioned whether they over-covered and under-analyzed these stories, our paranoid buddies on the right immediately get defensive about those nasty media liberals. It would be funny if it weren’t so sad, and so destructive.

http://handyfilm.blogspot.com handyguy

“White suprmacist” is just a label liberal ninnies throw around to cope with losing arguments. Often arguments that involve racial issues.

I told you he wouldn’t clarify. Just meaningless, self-serving word games [borrowed, of course, from Limbaugh].

http://handyfilm.blogspot.com handyguy

Some white supremacists who were maybe not just “winning arguments with liberals”:

“White women who marry outside their race should die.”
and
“The Jews have no part in this household.”
— Richard Butler, leader of the Aryan Nations [bankrupted by a lawsuit brought by the Southern Poverty Law Center, a brave and honorable organization Dan has slimed before on these pages]

“All races other than white are ‘mud races.'”
— Matthew Hale, founder, World Church of the Creator

zingzing

dan: “Baronius, no one is ever a “self proclaimed white supremacist”. ”

well, except brodie… he’s made it abundantly clear that he believes the white race to be superior to other races. he is also a white separatist. and an ugly human being.

zingzing

dan: “”White suprmacist” is just a label liberal ninnies throw around to cope with losing arguments.”

“white suprmacists” (sic) are a liberal fantasy? really? why would you think that? go to stormfront, or any other number of white supremacist websites… they really do exist, dan. that’s a very curious statement.

http://takeitorleaveit.typepad.com/ roger nowosielski

Many white supremacist wear they insignia with pride. It shows how dumb the really are.

You’ve got to give Dan credit for not claiming the title. His views don’t depart much, however, from the mainstream philosophy. What is it that they say? the leopard can’t change his spots.

That’s why I must have been thinking of, ruminating on the subject, while thinking of our good, all-so-sensitive Dan, the Dan who abhors ugliness and who can’t stand sadness – “Dan The Humanitarian,” for short.

really? there are so many dans floating around that maybe i’ve forgotten… really?

http://takeitorleaveit.typepad.com/ roger nowosielski

I was sarcastic, can’t you tell?

zingzing

hrm. sarcasm can be difficult to convey and hard to see…

http://www.maskedmoviesnobs.com El Bicho

“Are you sure they weren’t trying to get more information to later turn over to police?”—El bicho

thank you el bicho. You’ve taken blindly devoted absurdity to a new level.

Devoted to what exactly? You are the one devoted to a mindset based on your own prejudice and ignorance.

It’s rather obvious you didn’t bother to research the matter otherwise you would have easily learned that “the police said in a press release that Vera reported the incident to his cousin, a detective with the National City Police Department. Vera worked in ACORN’s National City office. The detective contacted a federal task force that deals with human smuggling, and an officer from the task force asked for more details” as reported by a San Diego TV station.

by the way, I am sure Glenn appreciates you proving his point that that “the Right Wing give no consideration whatsoever to the importance of accuracy and factuality”.

http://handyfilm.blogspot.com handyguy

Dan has his fingers in his ears, El B, yelling ‘nyah nyah I can’t hear you!’

Baronius

I don’t know Dan’s state of mind, but mine is complete apathy with regard to being called a racist. Dread did a little move where he said that Dan reminded him of someone who is a white supremacist – and then pretended that wasn’t an insult. Dan failed to denounce himself in a show trial, which means either that Dan’s a racist or that he’s bored with people calling him one. I know more people who are bored with it than are racists, so I’m assuming he’s among the bored.

http://takeitorleaveit.typepad.com/ roger nowosielski

The label was “white supremacist,” and Dan argued it doesn’t imply racism; so in his eyes, he is not the latter. The discussion came up six months ago or so in connection with CJ’s article, I believe (and the subject was a young operative for a white supremacy organization.)

As regards a person’s state of mine, one can only go by what they post.

http://handyfilm.blogspot.com handyguy

His contempt for the Southern Poverty Law Center speaks for itself.

http://handyfilm.blogspot.com handyguy

I know more people who are bored with it than are racists, so I’m assuming he’s among the bored.

Yeah, that’s some airtight logic right there.

“Show trial”? You are just ludicrous sometimes.

Dan

“Dan, I think it’s important that we clear this up. Do you believe that Chris Matthews is genetically superior to Tom Sowell? That Ginsburg is a better judge than Thomas? That Eminem is more talented than Hendrix?”—Baronius

I believe Jimi Hendrix to be a superior Constitutional scholar to Ginsberg, and Thomas Sowell would likely have more talent than Eminem.

By the way, it was the disgusting, dishonest treatment of Clarence Thomas during his confirmation hearings that led Breitbart to transition from liberal to conservative.

http://handyfilm.blogspot.com handyguy

And the disgusting, dishonest treatment of Anita Hill, in which David Brock actually participated, was part of the catalyst in changing Brock from conservative to liberal [and co-founding MediaMatters].

I would point out that Thomas did in the end get his seat on the court. Some of us think that was a pretty unhappy outcome for the country.

http://jeanniedanna.wordpress.com/ jeannie danna

the disgusting, dishonest treatment of Clarence Thomas during his confirmation hearings

What about the way, Judge Sotomayor was treated?

http://takeitorleaveit.typepad.com/ roger nowosielski

Thomas was a suspected rapist, unless Anita Hill was the Democrat’s plant.

Dan

In the end, Anita Hill was found to be untrustworthy by a overwhelming majority of those assembled to review the facts. She is still paraded around by some extreme liberal college groups as if she were never disgraced. Meanwhile, Thomas has gone on to set a tone of legal integrity, masterful opinions, and faithful adherence to Constitutional principle.

I don’t recall any outright personally destructive lies directed at Sotomeyer. Her detractors were more concerned with her actual bigoted legal opinions, along with the content of some of her speeches, and her admitted associations with La Raza (“the race”).

Can you imagine how a judicial candidate who belonged to a white racial advocacy organization named “the race” might fare?

http://www.maskedmoviesnobs.com El Bicho

“In the end, Anita Hill was found to be untrustworthy by a overwhelming majority of those assembled to review the facts.”

Really? Wikipedia states “the Judiciary Committee split 7–7 on September 27, sending the nomination to the full Senate without a recommendation. Thomas was confirmed by a 52–48 vote on October 15, 1991, the narrowest margin for approval in more than a century. The final floor vote was mostly along party lines: 41 Republicans and 11 Democrats voted to confirm while 46 Democrats and two Republicans voted to reject the nomination.”

Now I wouldn’t claim Wikipedia is a reliable source but I would trust it over Dan whose opinion of the ACORN matter was proven to be false just a few comments earlier. (and yes I noticed you gave up and tried to move on. it was rather obvious.)

Exactly who is this “overwhelming majority of those assembled to review the facts”?

http://handyfilm.blogspot.com handyguy

Wikipedia’s article on the Thomas/Hill hearings is actually pretty good. I’d say neither of them was “fairly” treated. It was, in some ways the beginning of the tabloid politics that characterized the Clinton impeachment. No one associated with it comes out smelling like a rose.

When people’s private lives are used as political weapons by others, no one wins.

Brock’s writings admitting to a smear job on Hill and his apology to her make riveting and convincing reading. His revelations about the Clinton-obsessed hatemongers in the conservative movement in the 1990s are amazing and horrifying [and occasionally hilarious].

It seems so long ago now!

Dan

“I would trust it over Dan whose opinion of the ACORN matter was proven to be false just a few comments earlier”—El bicho

My opinion is still that Acorn workers conspired to facilitate child sex slavery as it seems to appear in the recording. Your opinion is that they only pretended to facilitate child sex slavery in order to gather information to turn in to the police.

Not only are you serious, but you now suggest your opinion has been proven.

You go on to confuse a close vote for Clarence Thomas’ confirmation as a test of the veracity of Anita Hills testimony.

I don’t feel challenged here.

Handyguy, Isn’t David Brock gay?

zingzing

dan: “My opinion is still that Acorn workers conspired to facilitate child sex slavery as it seems to appear in the recording.”

so you opine that two people walk in off the street and lay out the plans for a child sex slavery ring and the employees of ACORN know just how to do that and give those two advice. child sex slavery. child. sex. slavery.

let’s say you had an appalling, illegal, totally grotesque plan that you wanted to enact. it’s really fucked up, disgusting and inhumane. i mean children are getting fucked repeatedly here. repeatedly. who do you go to for advice? who do you trust?

“Your opinion is that they only pretended to facilitate child sex slavery in order to gather information to turn in to the police.”

let’s pretend you’re an employee of a gov’t-backed community organization. a couple of people come in and want to set up a child sex slavery ring. hot damn! what do you do? throw them out the door? or do you get involved with this? …hmmm. children getting fucked repeatedly or children not getting fucked repeatedly while people conspiring to get children fucked repeatedly go to jail and get fucked repeatedly?

why, i believe the second option is the one that 99.9% of the populace would go for!

“Not only are you serious, but…”

you’d have to be an idiot to have your opinion. either that or a damn liar.

let’s say that every independent investigation that’s looked into this has come away with that same opinion. that anyone who believes the videos show what really happened is a fool.

logic, the evidence and the opinions of people who actually know what they are talking about are all against your opinion, dan.

http://handyfilm.blogspot.com handyguy

David Brock is indeed gay. Relevance?

The Acorn workers were presented with a fictional, not a real, prostitution scenario. There was no actual “child slavery.” Whether they were open to the idea of helping illegal sex workers, or were just being polite to the weird young man visiting them, is apparently an argument we could have until the end of the universe. [At least two of the Acorn folks did indeed call the cops; why do you say that’s not true?]

But no one at Acorn was charged with any crime, so why are you so obsessed with it? And illegal sex was never a central part of why conservatives objected to Acorn, so why is O’Keefe’s frat-boy prank meaningful in any way?

It’s not, except as an example of fake news/disinformation, which is what Glenn’s article is all about.

zingzing

breitbart and o’keefe are political assassins. they are just a symptom of the sickness of the right. if the right wants to play this way, just know that that sickness will infect the left, and they’ll get a dose of their own medicine (this metaphor is getting a bit muddled) very, very quickly.

it’s very easy to edit video and fool idiots. really, those running the right wing have a pretty low opinion of their followers.

http://www.maskedmoviesnobs.com El Bicho

“you now suggest your opinion has been proven.”

It wasn’t my opinion but that of the SDPD. I’ll leave it to readers to decide who did a more substantive investigation into this matter: local law enforcement or a crackpot who watched a video presented by people with an agenda.

“You go on to confuse a close vote for Clarence Thomas’ confirmation as a test of the veracity of Anita Hills testimony.”

Right. You are the one who claimed “In the end, Anita Hill was found to be untrustworthy by a overwhelming majority of those assembled to review the facts.”

I’ll ask again and apologize there’s no pictures to help you understand but exactly who is this “overwhelming majority of those assembled to review the facts” that you referenced if it wasn’t Senators?

“I don’t feel challenged here.”

No doubt because you aren’t smart enough to be. Your ignorance is a shield and you are part of what’s wrong with this country.

Dan

“logic, the evidence and the opinions of people who actually know what they are talking about are all against your opinion, dan.”—zingzing

Maybe you are as uninformed about this as you were about your claim that Breitbart was sued for deceptive tape editing, but you are aware that ACORN has been defunded because of these videos?

It doesn’t sound to me as if you’ve even watched them.

“you’d have to be an idiot to have your opinion. either that or a damn liar.”

Only an idiot would even attempt to profer your opinion—‘yes officer, I was just on my way to the police station to turn in this bag of cocaine, right before we…’

But please, rave on!

Perhaps the fraudulant vote tampering was done just to ‘test the system’ and they were planning on reporting that as well.

handyguy, intent matters legally. That is why undercover police sometimes set up internet stings masquerading as underage girls. And once again, the reason Acorn workers go free is because the evidence that proves their guilt was obtained illegaly.

Dan

”

“I’ll ask again and apologize there’s no pictures to help you understand but exactly who is this “overwhelming majority of those assembled to review the facts” that you referenced if it wasn’t Senators”

El, the vote was going to be partisan because Clarence Thomas, as black conservative, puts the lie to the racial myths liberals perpetrate. (does this need explaining to you as well?) The senators were not voting on whether they believed Anita.

Had they believed Anita however, Thomas would probably not have been confirmed. A lie against Thomas, if believed, could only hurt him.

Of course this is only my opinion, and the opinion of most observers at the time. You can have your own, and it can be a stupid one if you want.

zingzing

“Maybe you are as uninformed about this as you were about your claim that Breitbart was sued for deceptive tape editing, but you are aware that ACORN has been defunded because of these videos?”

yes am i aware of that, but that doesn’t prove they were right to do so. sherrod was fired, but when breitbart’s deception was uncovered, she was offered her job back. that’s easier to do than putting an entire organization back together, isn’t it?

also, i said breitbart should be sued because of his deceptive tape editing. never said he was. he has been sued, however. you made some grand point of that, but it never quite stuck. you can pretend that that’s what i said, but go back and look.

“Perhaps the fraudulant vote tampering was done just to ‘test the system’ and they were planning on reporting that as well.”

not that that happened. also, what do you think about your side’s “caging” practices? oh, you love those, don’t you?

“Only an idiot would even attempt to profer your opinion—‘yes officer, I was just on my way to the police station to turn in this bag of cocaine, right before we…'”

you really think they were trying to set up a child sex slavery ring with people who walked in off the street? you must think people are pretty stupid. would you, even if you were okay with child sex slavery, ever be that stupid? no? then why do you assume that other people would be?

you’re looking at some bad percentages for people a) that stupid, and b) cool with child sex slavery. really bad percentages.

also, the fact that the tapes are heavily edited, both on the front and back and during the actual proceedings, and the fact that any audio expert can tell you (and has told you) that the questions asked are dubbed onto the tape… none of this bothers you?

are you that blind (and deaf)?

Dan

“facilitate” is not the same as “setting up”. It’s all on the tape. If you watch it you can see exactly how it goes down. All very natural.

None of the interviews were edited during the “proceedings”. I thought we were already past that. Hadn’t you moved on to claiming ACORN employees were gathering evidence by pretending to facilitate child sex slavery? Which is it? Deceptive editing, or crime fighting heroes?

what are “caging practices”?

http://takeitorleaveit.typepad.com/ roger nowosielski

“Had they believed Anita however, Thomas would probably not have been confirmed. A lie against Thomas, if believed, could only hurt him.”

Fair enough, but you still haven’t got the case for “overwhelming majority” unless by extrapolation or star gazing.

Granted, the close vote for Thomas was partisan through and through. I can’t think of the breakdown. So let’s say the few Democrats who voted for confirmation weren’t swayed by the Anita Hill story. What about the Republicans, though? Are you suggesting they would put moral principles above having the choice candidate confirmed?

Anyway, none of this adds up to your original claim that Anita Hill was disbelieved by an overwhelming majority. It’s just something you want to believe.

And truly, if she was lying, then she must have been the Democrat’s plant. But apparently, you have no problem with this interpretation because the Democrats always play dirty.

Dan

Wikipedia: “In 1991, public opinion polls showed that a vast majority of those polled believed Thomas over Hill”.

I guess “vast” is not the same as “overwhelming” and the public is not the same as the senate members, but the hearings were widely viewed and reported on. The fact that a couple of witnesses for Anita gave statements but refused to testify at the hearing couldn’t have helped. Thomas had more reliable witnesses who were happy to testify to his professional conduct.

zingzing

dan: “”facilitate” is not the same as “setting up”. It’s all on the tape. If you watch it you can see exactly how it goes down. All very natural.”

uh huh. sure. you know what i meant. it’s all on the tape(s). do you deny that the police were called?

“None of the interviews were edited during the “proceedings”.”

you know what i mean. there were edits during the bits inside of the offices. audio edits, video edits. do you deny that there were edits during the “interviews?”

“I thought we were already past that. Hadn’t you moved on to claiming ACORN employees were gathering evidence by pretending to facilitate child sex slavery? Which is it? Deceptive editing, or crime fighting heroes?”

deceptive editing of crime fighting heroes (in vera’s case) and deceptive editing of innocent people (in la). why’d they call the police, dan? why? also, plenty of the video is edited to make it look like they’re talking about things that they aren’t. like the video in la. the actual audio is about getting a woman who has a past as a prostitute some housing. the video you saw? looks like something completely different.

even fox news says that it’s “almost inconceivable” that a human being would do this (“this” being what you think they are doing). glen beck said “you know that if this couple came into your office and said this, you wouldn’t sit there…”

you know why fox news said that? BECAUSE IT’S STUPID. you wouldn’t sit there if someone was trying to “facilitate” a child prostitution ring. use your brain, dan.

it’s a joke. a stunt. a con. and you got taken. but enough evidence has built up that you should be able to use whatever critical capabilities you have to figure that out.

breitbart and o’keefe are suckering you. and you look like a fool.

you can claim you actually believe them, but nobody is that stupid. i’m sure you’ve seen the evidence that it was a hoax. it’s a hoax, dan. if you hang on to this, no one’s going to believe you when something real happens. breitbart is persona non grata at this point. he’s a proven liar.

“what are “caging practices”?”

give me a break. google it.

http://www.maskedmoviesnobs.com El Bicho

“you are aware that ACORN has been defunded because of these videos?”

Are you now claiming Congress never acts hastily? Because uninformed caving to public pressure is no proof of anything.

“None of the interviews were edited during the ‘proceedings’.”

Actually some were according to the CA Atty General’s report. The people who compiled it saw the unedited footage. Did you?

“Only an idiot would even attempt to profer your opinion—‘yes officer, I was just on my way to the police station to turn in this bag of cocaine, right before we…'”

But that’s an excuse by someone who got caught. As phone records indicate in the report, Vera contacted his cousin in law enforcement nearly a month before the tapes went public and he would have needed an alibi so the idiotic opinion is yours.

For the benefit of everyone else since you won’t let the facts of the case get in the way of your opinion I present this tidbit from the AG (PDF): “The evidence illustrates that things are not always as partisan zealots portray them through highly selective editing of reality. Sometimes a fuller truth is found on the cutting room floor.”

It’s a good read for those interested.

If you have evidence to indicate differently in the case, it’s odd that you would keep it to yourself. Or are you like the child that refuses to give up his belief in Santa Claus even though he saw Mommy wrapping the presents?

http://www.maskedmoviesnobs.com El Bicho

So now it’s not the “overwhelming majority of those assembled to review the facts” but “a vast majority of those polled”. Do you really think those phrases are the same?

It’s hysterical to see so many people around here state things that are false and then when called out refuse to admit they were wrong or misspoke. How about checking what you are talking about before spouting off?

http://takeitorleaveit.typepad.com/ roger nowosielski

Precisely. I was going to put the same question to him.

http://jeanniedanna.wordpress.com/ jeannie danna

Dan

Wikipedia: “In 1991, public opinion polls showed that a vast majority of those polled believed Thomas over Hill”. editable resource…do you have any other proof?

http://handyfilm.blogspot.com handyguy

The “vast majority” was actually a substantial plurality: “47% of those polled believed Thomas, while 24% believed Hill” [and Wikipedia’s editors added a “citation needed” note to that figure].

And we’re still to this day using these two individuals, Thomas and Hill, as political footballs, kicking them back and forth, claiming that something still ambiguous has been “proven.”

http://handyfilm.blogspot.com handyguy

I’ll refer anyone who is still interested to the links I posted in #132: four articles/reports that review the evidence in the Acorn case.

John Wilson

177-Dan re-asserts a falsehood about ACORN:

“My opinion is still that Acorn workers conspired to facilitate child sex slavery as it seems to appear in the recording.”

But of course the APPEARANCE is wrong; it is a contrived and doctored video. There can hardly be any doubt of that. Even a novice editor easily detects the over-dubbed falsehood.

http://jeanniedanna.wordpress.com/ jeannie danna

Has any entity taken ACORN’s place to help people register to vote?

the APPEARANCE is wrong; it is a contrived and doctored video.

How many people have been disenfranchised from the voting process?

IMO, this was the primary goal. How convenient, this excuse of moral high ground.

zingzing

jeannie: “IMO, this was the primary goal. How convenient, this excuse of moral high ground.”

the right is really quite good at voter suppression. clever people.

Baronius

Handy – There’s something wrong with David Brooks. You see this type of person in politics. He goes a little lower than anyone else, takes everything a little too far, then switches sides and does the same thing. I remember his article about Bill Clinton that sort of broke the Paula Jones story. It obviously was poorly sourced, but he went ahead with it anyway. I didn’t realize he founded Media Matters, but that explains a lot.

David Stockman was one. He worked for the Anderson campaign, then knifed them in the back and joined the Reagan camp. Sure enough, when he grew tired of that, he betrayed the Reagan people. You don’t want to get too cozy around these people.

A while back, I made the comment that Breitbart might one day switch sides. This is what I was thinking about. These guys who “go big or go home” can sometimes turn out to be rats.

http://jeanniedanna.wordpress.com/ jeannie danna

I just heard about, Senator Tedd Stevens and the people flying with him…RIP

http://jeanniedanna.wordpress.com/ jeannie danna

Party shouldn’t matter, it divides us all.

http://blogcritics.org/writers/irene-athena Irene Athena

Baronius, I must play the typo-Nazi. You meant to say “David Brock” instead of “David Brook.” They’re both journalists, yes, and it doesn’t help that David Brock has, as you mentioned, changed his stripes so dramatically, describing “The Real Anita Hill” as “a little bit nutty, a little bit slutty” and THEN giving us the Media Matters organization.

I’m withholding all comment on my perception of the genuineness of the change of heart. Just thought for clarity’s sake, something ought to be said.

http://handyfilm.blogspot.com handyguy

I believe Brock’s version: he was faking it then [as a “conservative activist journalist” and furtive, closet-case homo], and he’s sincere — and much happier — now [counterpunching at the right wing “noise machine” he knows well from his inside days; and living openly and contentedly as a gay man]. I recommend both his books: “Blinded by the Right” and “The Republican Noise Machine.”

Handy, I didn’t choose those examples because they’re convenient for me, in an effort to smear the left-of-center. I hadn’t thought of them as liberals, because my thesis is that they’re not. They get off on the treachery. They’ll be on my side next time, and they’ll be vicious against their old allies.

Take Dick Morris. Some people on the right adore him now that he’s “converted”. He’s obsessed with Hillary Clinton. There wasn’t a drift in ideology like the people you mentioned. He’s a creepy guy who loves the knife in the back. He was untrustworthy then, and he’s untrustworthy now.

Thanks for the catch about BROCK, Irene.

http://blogcritics.org/writers/dr-dreadful/ Dr Dreadful

Has any entity taken ACORN’s place to help people register to vote?

There always were plenty of other groups besides ACORN whose mission was voter registration, and most of those are still going strong.

The whole ACORN thing blew up during the ’08 presidential saga… ahem, I mean campaign… mainly because of Barack Obama’s association with the organization. It was one of the few bits of dirt that Obama wasn’t able to brush off with relative ease, and just about the only one that persisted into his actual presidency.

It was one of those small, ostensibly insignificant ideas that just happen to get traction: like the idea that a small, reclusive European population of Semitic origin might somehow be capable of bringing entire countries to their knees, or that a mildly hallucinogenic plant might be a deadly social menace that must be eradicated at all costs.

http://handyfilm.blogspot.com handyguy

David Brock admits he used sleazy tactics against Anita Hill and Bill Clinton, and regrets them and says he has repudiated them.

Whatever you think of MediaMatters, they are not sleazy. They are often in attack mode, but often against people who are themselves vicious attackers.

Here are the four headlines currently rotating on their site. Are they nasty? Pretty mild mannered actually.

Media Conservatives Say They “Favor Religious Freedom,” But … [about the anti-mosque protests around the US]

http://jeanniedanna.wordpress.com/ jeannie danna

Doc,

There always were plenty of other groups besides ACORN whose mission was voter registration, and most of those are still going strong.

I understood that, ACORN was primarily devoted to minority voters. Am, I correct?

so…are these other organizations based in the inner cities?

http://handyfilm.blogspot.com handyguy

For the political junkies out there:

Chuck Todd is subbing for Chris Matthews this week on MSNBC’s Hardball — and it’s about a 1000% improvement. The guy is so smart and such a sharp interviewer. Don’t miss if you like this kind of political show [more ‘inside baseball’ than partisan].

http://handyfilm.blogspot.com handyguy

Jeannie, Acorn was not just about voter registration. They worked to financially and politically empower the urban poor, through housing assistance, through demonstrations and petitions against employers and landlords, and yes, through voter registration.

What they were not was an organized crime enterprise or an enabler of child prostitution rings.

They weren’t perfect — there were indeed some overeager voter registration workers, as well as an embezzlement scandal. But the right never talks about what Acorn really was…only the caricatures of registration fraud and the Breitbart video.

As Rachel Maddow pointed out, in a rare segment where she was visibly angry, companies like Blackwater and BP continue to get big government contracts…while Acorn, whose federal funding was fairly small potatoes, got slimed and shafted with no opportunity to defend itself.

The 1993 National Voting Rights Act (NVRA), also known as the “motor voter law,” requires states to offer voter registration at motor vehicle agencies, by mail and at public assistance and disability offices.

On June 1 the DOJ Civil Rights Division issued updated and more detailed information on which offices must provide registration services, who must be offered the forms, what type of assistance must be provided and how the forms are to be handled.

According to Demos a non-partisan public policy research and advocacy organization headquartered in New York City, the guidance sends a strong signal to states of the importance of providing voter registration as required by federal law and represents a departure from the practices of the Bush Administration, which did not enforce the public assistance provisions of NRVA.

It turns out that MM pulled the comments out of context, and Gray and Burguiere were actually parodying MM. Did MM apologize? Sort of. They posted the following:

CORRECTION: The original headline on this clip did not make clear that Beck’s co-hosts were being satirical when they linked MSNBC host Keith Olbermann to the Manchester shooting. The original clip also did not include their subsequent statements that Olbermann was not responsible for the shooting. Media Matters regrets the error.

and changed the headline to “Beck sidekicks equate linking Beck to CA shooter with blaming Olbermann for Manchester rampage”. Note that they didn’t admit that their story is the exact opposite of what they reported, only that they didn’t make it clear that it was a parody. These are the guys that you say aren’t sleazy? It took me all of 10 minutes to find a case of MM pulling quotes out of context in order to smear their opponents, and it took place last week.

http://handyfilm.blogspot.com handyguy

My definition of ‘sleazy’ doesn’t include people who run corrections. Something Breitbart virtually never ever does.

But of course you will use this one example as “proof” of your entire thesis, even though you probably look at MM once a year if that often.

http://blogcritics.org/writers/irene-athena Irene Athena

Point goes: to the side with a sense of humor:
G&B: 1 MM: 0
(That wasn’t sarcasm, Baronius. It’s pretty much my new political philosophy.)

http://blogcritics.org/writers/irene-athena Irene Athena

MM could come up in the ranks, though, with a little effort. But it has to look like unstudied effort.

OK guys, you can get back to it.

Baronius

This thread, I thought, was a discussion of honesty in fact-checking. The cardinal sin was declared to be taking quotes out of context for the purpose of deception. We have mentioned two stories in which MM did exactly that. Does that shake your faith in them, even a little? No, you pre-announced that it wouldn’t. You already said that we could come to you with any number of examples of bad faith from MM, and you’d continue to support them, because they have a large number of writers.

For the life of me, I can’t imagine how you think you’re holding the higher ground on this.

You take four headlines from the past week and display them as if they prove MM is reasonable. I take one headline from the past week and demonstrate how they were libelous (or at best incompetent), and that doesn’t meet your rigorous standards. You’re right; I haven’t proven that all their stories are false. But shouldn’t it tell you something that I could find partisan fiction on their site with little effort? What makes you think that they’re any more reliable than Breitbart’s sites, other than your sympathy with their conclusions?

http://handyfilm.blogspot.com handyguy

They. Ran. A. Correction.

That’s why.

You are getting pretty sanctimonious about this. Go ahead and read Andrew Breitbart, and have a nice day.

I bet there are people and organizations that wish they still had total control over this medium.Pharma,BP,Fox News…

Baronius

Jeannie, did you watch the clip?

Handy, would you watch the clip?

The host of the show referred to the 14th Amendment as “the anchor baby amendment”, as MM reported in their headline…then he laughed under his breath, and explained the historical reason for the 14th Amendment. MM reported that he was trivializing the amendment, which is false. There’s another MM deception caused by taking something out of context. Jeannie, would you care to post more proofs of their sleaziness? ’cause you’re saving me time.

http://jeanniedanna.wordpress.com/ jeannie danna

Baronius,

Actually, no.

I just grabbed it for you. So, I guess I better go watch it now. back later tonight

I am flabbergasted that you would try to defend the idiots, yes, idiots who host “Fox & Friends,” one of the silliest shows on television. The smirky way the guy in the clip says “anchor baby amendment” is indeed quite trivializing.

Nothing sleazy about the Media Matters piece. A great deal is objectionable about the way conservatives are using rhetoric about a constitutional change that is never going to happen for cheap political points in a midterm election.

Of course, if the dumbest of the dumb-dumbs in the GOP keep talking about “anchor babies” they will alienate all the remaining Hispanic voters they haven’t already turned off, and they will never again win a national election.

Baronius

It’s not about “anchor babies”. I understand why you’d want to change the subject. If someone starts an “anchor baby” thread, we’d probably agree on a lot of things. What we’ve been talking about is whether your or my media watchdogs are guilty of distortion. You’ve seen the clip; he wasn’t trivializing the amendment. He (clumsily) explained the origin of the 14th Amendment and how it relates to the current debate, providing context that might have been missing from others’ coverage.

I’ve never watched Fox & Friends. I don’t know if they’re idiots. MM gave a false depiction of the conversation. I don’t know if you and Jeannie will admit that in print, but I’d hope that you would both keep it in mind.

http://handyfilm.blogspot.com handyguy

I think your description of the clip and your characterization of MM’s article are dead wrong. I would say laughably wrong, but one thing you almost never are [on here] is funny.

Fox & Friends, Fox News’s equivalent of the Today Show, is an endless font of hilarity for shows that ridicule clips of other shows: Joel McHale’s Talk Soup on E! and Jon Stewart and Keith Olbermann. The three hosts are airhead blowhards of the first order.

When leftist commentators get it wrong, I’m perfectly happy to admit it. But I don’t necessarily disown the source because of it.

Last night, for example, Olbermann’s whole show was a whine about Robert Gibbs’s “professional left” zinger. I thought it was over the top. The night before, he had Arianna Huffington on and they proceeded to misquote and slime Robert Rubin with great glee. I like Olbermann and Huffington, generally, but they are capable of being really annoying.

[Huffington, by the way, is another leopard who changed her spots from conservative to liberal. Brock discusses her entertainingly in “Blinded by the Right.” And in his other book, “The Republican Noise Machine,” he complains about Phil Donahue’s MSNBC show being canceled and replaced by “apolitical newsreader” Keith Olbermann. This was 2002 or 2003, before Keith became the entertaining loudmouth he is today. Too funny reading that now!]

http://jeanniedanna.wordpress.com/ jeannie danna

Baronius,

“My grandmother immigrated from Italy and bore five children. Are you now saying that my mother,aunts and uncles were not American citizens?

Please read some of this link:

[The United States adopted the Fourteenth Amendment in 1868 to ensure due process and equal protection of the laws to all persons regardless of race, color, or ancestry. Birthright citizenship was enshrined in the first sentence of the amendment: “All persons born or naturalized in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States.”] source #221

There is no mention of anchor babies here.

Baronius

Jeannie, the topic isn’t “anchor babies”. It’s whether Media Matters fairly described the clip from Fox & Friends. If they did, then they were a fair media watchdog. If they didn’t, then they weren’t.

They didn’t. The intent of the segment on Fox & Friends was to prevent people from trivializing the 14th Amendment. Media Matters described it as an attempt to trivialize the 14th Amendment. That’s false.

If you want to talk about immigration reform, I can’t stop you, but it would constitute a change in subject.

http://jeanniedanna.wordpress.com/ jeannie danna

Tricky, Baronius,

Just wants to talk about, MM not the actual subject…

: )Keep talking anchor babies! You’ll never see the inside of the White House again.

Dan

a Rassmusen poll in June 2010 found that 58% of voters don’t think babies born to illegal immigrants should automatically become citizens. 33% thought they should.

I imagine the 33% don’t pay taxes.

http://handyfilm.blogspot.com handyguy

Baronius, last time I looked, you don’t get to declare “what the subject is.” This is a public forum. You misinterpreted that silly video clip and insist on having a repetitive hissy fit about it. “And you’re changing the subject!!” Oh, my.

http://handyfilm.blogspot.com handyguy

Dan, Jeannie and I pay taxes. We’re in the 33%, or whatever the real number is…I wouldn’t expect you to quote any other poll besides Rasmussen, of course.

As I said above, it’s possible that the GOP will get some short-term gain in individual elections this year by the despicable use of this non-issue.

But no constitutional amendment is ever going to result from this “debate” — and you can kiss the Latino vote goodbye for years to come. Just as the GOP has already written off the black vote.

And, by the way, that last line about taxes was a nasty and superfluous cheap shot. But you had to get another dig in at the poor — to keep your blood pumping?

PS You do realize Obama carried the millionaire vote in 2008? And quite a few of those folks are more than willing to go back to 2000-level tax rates if it will help fiscally.

Baronius

OK, let me put it differently. The article and the thread were about media watchdogs: Breitbart, Moore, Limbaugh, Media Matters. If you guys want to change the subject, knock yourselves out. I wish you a long and enjoyable conversation.

Dan

handyguy, the poll demonstrates that eliminating the despicable, parasitic, practice of anchor babys is a winning issue.

I’ll take your word for it that you pay taxes, but I’d bet that the 33% are a net drain, you included.

It’s not a “dig” on the poor. It’s a dig on the immoral entitlement mindset of some people. More than 33% don’t pay taxes. Not all poor people are for anchor babies. With good reason. They will suffer the most from rampant importation of poverty.

http://handyfilm.blogspot.com handyguy

Define “rampant.” How many of these kids do you think there are? In a population and an economy the size of the US, what net effect do you think this actually has? It is all political rhetoric, hot air.

You have learned your lessons well from your mentors, Limbaugh and Breitbart. You place such a high value on propaganda that you don’t know how to communicate in a regular speaking voice.

You think it doesn’t matter whether what you say is literally true, as long as you say it loud enough and often enough, and never, ever admit that you might be wrong and someone with a different idea might be right.

http://handyfilm.blogspot.com handyguy

Mr B: Subjects get changed all the time on threads. It’s not a new concept.

Anyhow, I told you I think you’re wrong about the clip, more than once. How much more is there to say about it and about its limited significance?

http://handyfilm.blogspot.com handyguy

The working poor who “don’t pay taxes” are a myth. They may not pay income taxes, but they do pay payroll taxes, and sales taxes, which can take quite a bite out of a low income.

Do you place any value at all on empathy and compassion, Dan? You certainly choose to keep it well hidden.

Dan

60,000 anchor babies annually in Texas alone.

I wouldn’t mind being wrong about something. If it were ever to happen, I would hope to comport myself more civilly than you.

http://drdreadful.blogspot.com Dr Dreadful

I wouldn’t mind being wrong about something. If it were ever to happen…

On the frequent occasions it has happened, you’ve disappeared more completely than a surplus under a Republican president.

If you call that comporting yourself civilly, then fine.

http://handyfilm.blogspot.com handyguy

You say deliberately provocative things, and then whine when someone reacts.

From Wikipedia, on the misnomer ‘anchor baby':

a US citizen child cannot file for a US visa for its parents until the child is 21 years of age, and upon reaching that age the child must also be earning at least 125% of the US poverty threshhold to be able to apply.

Thus, temporary or illegal immigrants who have babies in the US have no means of remaining legally in the US; they must return home and wait until the child reaches age 21.

http://handyfilm.blogspot.com handyguy

I love that “if it were ever to happen,” as if it is such a rare or unknown occurrence.

Dan

Dr. Dreadful demonstrates the same unsupported wishful thinking that infects his arguments.

I would also hope that if I were ever to be repeatedly wrong about things, I would retain the dignity to not continually thrust my negativity at every opportunity toward the source of my feelings of inferiority.

http://www.maskedmoviesnobs.com El Bicho

“I wouldn’t mind being wrong about something. If it were ever to happen…”

If? All you have to do is look at your earlier comments in this thread where it’s been shown. Are you delusional or do you suffer anterograde amnesia like Memento’s Leonard Shelby?

Either way, it seems like an absolute waste of time conversing with you because you obviously have no desire to have a dialogue and are more interested in winding up people you disagree with.

Dan

Baronius is also correct about the “anchor baby amendment”. The fox crew was educating it’s viewers—something non-fox news outlets rarely do, which is why fox viewers are more informed—on the historical relevance of the 14th amendment.

In no way were they “trivializing” it. It’s absurd to even think that is what was happening in that particular clip.

Dan

El Bicho, Oh yes, that’s right. I opined that an “overwhelming majority” perceived Anita Hill to be untruthful, when it was really a “vast majority”. Which is of course, nearly the opposite in meaning.

http://drdreadful.blogspot.com Dr Dreadful

Unsupported wishful thinking? I don’t think so.

For instance, there’s your recent claim regarding McCarthy’s famous “list”, which I demonstrated, rather easily and with citations, to be erroneous.

http://www.maskedmoviesnobs.com El Bicho

“I wouldn’t mind being wrong about something.”

Good thing because you are wrong about this also. Quick, mark it down before you forget.

“I opined that an “overwhelming majority” perceived Anita Hill to be untruthful, when it was really a “vast majority”. ”

No, you didn’t that’s a lie. You wrote a little bit more than that, and people can go back and read for themselves. I am copying this from your comment: “Anita Hill was found to be untrustworthy by a overwhelming majority of those assembled to review the facts.”

When history and I proved you wrong about “those assembled to review the facts”, you backtracked and attempted to change your statement by citing Wikipedia that “public opinion polls showed that a vast majority of those polled believed Thomas over Hill”.

If you had a shred of integrity, you’d admit you were wrong instead of trying to change the goal posts. I am now bored with your foolishness. I hope for your sake you aren’t this dishonest in your offline life.

http://jeanniedanna.wordpress.com/ jeannie danna

Dan,

This isn’t about, Anchor Babies, the Fourteenth Amendment, or immigration.

no,no,no

It’s about votes and using the babies as a wedge issue. In fact, this is going to backfire in your faces…so, please keep talking!

: )

http://jeanniedanna.wordpress.com/ jeannie danna

Dan,

Change the channel once in a while.

The fox crew was educating it’s viewers—something non-fox news outlets rarely do, which is why fox viewers are more informed

– Side 1’s blanket statement
– Side 2’s blanket statement
– Side 1 refutes statement with examples / points out contradiction in argument
– Side 2 says that those are exceptions
– Side 1 provides more examples
– Side 2 changes subject

If I was being a stickler about the change of subject, it’s because I could feel that this thread was slipping away just before Handy would have to face facts about his side’s media watchdogs. You don’t get many opportunities to really corner someone online.

And yes, I’m sure there’ve been times that I was on Side 2.

http://handyfilm.blogspot.com handyguy

You bet there have been, B, including on this very thread. You and Dan had basically just stopped listening to anti-Breitbart/O’Keefe arguments before the thread even started.

MediaMatters and other fact-checking web sites — on the right as well as the left! — have dozens of researchers going line by line through Limbaugh and Beck and other broadcasters’ output. And thank God they do. It’s a very valuable service.

Of course, it makes sense for opponents of Media Matters to turn the tables on them and go line by line through their output to find instances of exaggeration or unfairness or inaccuracy.

You are way too anxious to find via isolated examples an excuse to be able to discredit MM in toto. In part this seems to be a reaction to the fact that so many on the left have written off Breitbart as an untrustworthy hack who will post anything for a short-term sensation, facts be damned.

Breitbart’s best-known posts [O’Keefe/Acorn, John Lewis, Sherrod] were all tainted by this hyperpartisan gotcha mentality. Maybe he’s done other work that’s more thoughtful and useful and I should give him a second look.

But his whole attitude [as he more or less admits, see his speech at CPAC] is, “I don’t give a shit what the left or other media say; I’m working for the greater good, and if my posts take down someone who deserves to be taken down, facts and fairness are secondary. And if there’s collateral damage, like Shirley Sherrod, I don’t give a rat’s ass.”

Dan finds this stance heroic, and perhaps you do too. I find it nauseating and utterly irresponsible.

And PS: I was not and am not changing the subject, certainly not because I think I’m losing an argument. The right’s lies about “anchor babies” and the 14th amendment are directly related to the article and the thread.

Baronius

Handy, you’re a fair guy. You’re willing to call out either side. My bet is that when you defend things that are biased, it sticks in your craw. (I’d guess that lot of other people around here, on both sides, aren’t humble or smart enough to recognize their own spin.)

As for the ACORN tapes, I read the accusations of unfairness, and aside from Wilson’s claim that they’re obviously doctored, there was nothing new presented. That’s not true: there was the lie by Media Matters, but I’m not counting that as new evidence.

http://jeanniedanna.wordpress.com/ jeannie danna

Baronius,

You must be on side 2, no?

Side 2 changes subject

: )Limbaugh,Limbaugh,Limbaugh! That’s all you wanted to take about on my last thread… We could have talked about the Fourteenth Amendment months ago.

http://jeanniedanna.wordpress.com/ jeannie danna

opps! My mistake, it was next to the last thread…never mind.

http://blogcritics.org/writers/dr-dreadful/ Dr Dreadful

And, true to form, Dan disappears again.

http://handyfilm.blogspot.com handyguy

Perhaps we should give him the benefit of the doubt and assume he has to work for a living. =)

But you’re correct, Doc. Dan’s mode here has been to shout, “Your argument is full of it,” and then claim to have won. Zing, El B, you and I have all made specific points about O’Keefe and Breitbart that he has ignored entirely, except when he pops up again periodically to say, “you guys are full of it,” or “I’m the civil one, you’re the one making personal attacks.”

These are not discussions or even arguments, because all one of the combatants does is throw a grenade and then retreat to his foxhole. No pun intended.

http://handyfilm.blogspot.com handyguy

Baronius, thanks for calling me a fair guy, but I do not knowingly defend dishonest or inaccurate journalism/opinions — and I don’t appreciate the implication that I do.

There are going to be numerous instances where, presented with the same evidence, we draw opposite conclusions. It can be frustrating if it’s something you feel strongly about, but it’s still gonna happen.

Billy

It’s too bad that everyone has to forever sift through so much bullsh*t in order to have some type of educated guess at what might be actually happening in the world or who is really telling the truth.